Chaos Freqency: Text 1: Freqency Incomplete
by Shin Kerron
Summary: Better story then summery. Sonic and the others face yet another threat to the world as the chaos emeralds are being stolen. But as the secrets of the emeralds are reveiled, and new friends and foes alike appear, what will happen to our heroes of earth?
1. Chaos Emerald Stolen

Author's comments

Well, here it is, my first Sonic fanfic. This story will not involve events in Sonic X, mostly because I haven't seen it, and only some of the events of Shadow the Hedgehog, possible spoiler warnings are now, even though the ending kinda sucked and ruined what might have been a perfectly good game…lazy writers, leaving so many holes in the plot…Forgive me if you're not a fan of original characters, aka: OCs.  
Neco: I would like to state that my creator is insane. ….really insane….Please help me!  
You say insane like it's a bad thing. Back in the box you go Neco (shoves Neco in the cardboard box I keep all my characters in)  
Eneco: Heh, so easily pushed around.  
What are you doing out? You're not even in the story yet. IN THE BOX! (shoves Eneco into the box as well)

I wish to state I do not own Sonic the Hedgehog or any of his friends, foes, rivals, or…yeah, you get the idea. I do not own Moon the Wolf or Star the wolf either, they belong to a good friend of mine, Kestril195. I do however own this storyline, as well as Neco the Fox, Eneco the fox, and GEM. So, don't steal or the guys that run this place could do something you won't like.

Note: "" are used for normal speaks, ("") is for thoughts. Why must it be so annoying to have to do these things…?

* * *

The white chaos emerald rested atop the velvet pillow in its glass case. It reflected the perfect sphere in the sky through the skylight of the Central City Museum. A fox with slightly off-white fur and eyes that had a silver color to their irises sighed as he leaned against one of several support pillars, his black trench coat making his fur seem even lighter in comparison. He dug his hands into the pockets of his tan pants as he stared at the jewel. If it hadn't been for the two break-ins involving the disappearance of two of the seven powerful emeralds he wouldn't even be here. 

He yawned widely. He was used to being up during the early hours of the morning when every sane living thing was asleep, but it didn't make rarely ever getting a decent night's sleep any easier. Sometimes he hated his job working for GEM, the General Enforcement Militia. But still, it did keep food in his stomach.

He started to wonder just how such a small gemstone could contain such fabled powers. The fate of their world had been thrown into distress countless times thanks to those seven emeralds. And yet, standing here looking at it, while obviously it was valuable, it was hard to believe they contained a power that could cause the destruction or salvation of their world.

The fox started to message his brow, he could tell he had the beginnings of a splitting headache starting. He'd have to take something for it or he'd be awake for what little time he'd have to rest after this mission. Just at that moment there was a loud shattering sound as numerous silent alarms went off. The fox quickly shifted his attention to the black figure that had just fallen atop the glass case, landing on one knee.

The figure had spines that stood straight out, not curving neither up nor down, and its body was pure black. It was easily identified as a hedgehog. It rammed its fist through the side of the glass case and took hold of the emerald within. The fox instantly drew two guns from his trench coat and had them both aimed at the hedgehog. "Hold it right there!" He demanded. The hedgehog looked up, as if just noticing him. The fox almost gasped. The Hedgehog had only crimson irises, no pupils what so ever.

The hedgehog saw the moment of hesitation and quickly made its move. It jumped off the remains of the case towards the wall, emerald in hand, and then kicked off the wall towards the opposite one, doing so again and again as it headed steadily upwards, towards the broken skylight it had smashed through previously.

The fox smirked as he stepped on the hidden switch near the pillar he had been leaning against. GEM had thought ahead of the possibility of someone trying to use the skylight for entrance and exit, so they had recently installed an energy grid. There were several ports around the skylight that instantly sprang to life when the switch had been pushed. Streams of electricity shot across to their corresponding ports on the opposite side, forming a crisscrossing grid.

Unfortunately, what would have normally stopped any intruder, this one saw the method of cutting its escape off and hurtled itself towards one of the ports. It curled itself tightly into a somewhat ball shape as its momentum allowed it to smash the port. The whole grid came falling down as well as the hedgehog, unable to find a way through as the wreckage fell.

As the ports fell, several of which still generating a current between them, the chaos emerald had slipped out of the hedgehog's grasp, and had fallen to the ground, between two of the still active ports. The current went through the emerald, defying logic as the as an emerald should not have been a conductor of electricity. The fox shook his head, reminding himself just what kind of emerald he was dealing with here.

The current finally died down. Seeing as the adversary was still recovering from the fall, the fox took the opportunity to grab the emerald. Regardless about wither or not the thief got away, the main priority was to see that the chaos emerald was secure. The fox got on one knee as he reached down to pick it up.

The instant his fingers so much as brushed against the chaos emerald, he was hit with what felt something similar to the effect of being electrocuted with a lethal voltage. He would have screamed in the pain if he felt his control of all voluntary functions leave him, slowly fainting as he collapsed on the floor.

The hedgehog got to its feet. "Estimated damage, 4.5. No hindrances to functions located. Beginning repairs. Will resume chaos emerald retrieval mission." It said in a dull flat monotone voice. It picked the emerald from besides the unconscious fox and then looked upwards. "Signal received, rapid transport possible." It said in its same emotionless voice. It then simply faded from view along with the chaos emerald.

Across town another black hedgehog stood, atop a high building, staring at the moon in the sky. This one's spines curved upwards at their ends, and had red stripes. His eyes were currently closed and his arms were folded. He opened his eyes, showing the deep crimson eyes that had eerily dark pupils. He glanced towards the opposite side of the city. "…Something's up…something involved with the chaos emeralds." He said in his deep voice. "…Normally this wouldn't be my problem, but if it involves the chaos emeralds…" He began. He shook his head. "No…let the city deal with it." He decided. He jumped off the building and literally ran down its side, the small jets on his shoes making friction no problem. Reaching the bottom he jumped and ran off, disappearing into that which shared his name.

* * *

"Damn it Neco, that's the third one this month!" A tall, broad shouldered, and dark skinned male human yelled in anger. He sighed and calmed himself, realizing he was displacing his anger onto the white furred fox sitting opposite him. "I'm sorry, I know that there wasn't a lot you could do. We didn't expect something like that to happen to you. You were fallowing orders to keep the emerald safe when it happened." He said. Neco looked like he had been to hell and back, somehow whatever hit him when he touched the emerald had left bruises visible through his fur. "We also weren't counting on it being able to break that barrier." Neco added. The man nodded. 

"This is going to result in a lot more paperwork, a single chaos emerald can create enough to last months, and here's the third emerald stolen in just one. GUN isn't too fond of us as is, and they'll most likely try and use this against us…If the museum would have just let us put up better security…" The man muttered. Neco sighed as he looked down.

"…Wasn't a complete loss though. You did manage to get a good look at the thief, something all those security cameras before wouldn't let us do." The man said. "I want you to talk to that friend of yours, Moon was her name right? She's better at doing criminal profiles then anyone we've got here. You've got the rest of today and tomorrow off. Get some rest. You look like you've been through ten rounds with an enraged badger on steroids." The man said. "Yes chief." Neco responded.

Neco stood up and exited the chief of GEM's office. The chief sighed and leaned back in his chair. "With those seven emeralds involved…for all we know this could turn into another disaster like the Chaos Perfect attack or the ARC incident." He muttered. "…Neco, I seriously hope that you'll be able to help us do something about it…It's high time the people had a way to keep themselves safe. We don't know when we won't be able to rely on a hero." He said, looking over at some newspaper clippings that were framed on the wall, several of which were dated between two and three years ago, showing black and white photos of a hedgehog smirking, usually with a two tailed fox and sometimes an echidna nearby.

* * *

Neco dug through his pockets, eventually finding a small silver key. He inserted it into its keyhole and turned it. Hearing the small click, he opened the door and entered his apartment. He headed for his bedroom. He removed his trench coat and hung it on the hook he had placed next to his bedroom door. He then unloaded and placed his two guns in the drawer in the nightstand next to his bed. Both had the words Ome o Kisuru engraved in them, the Japanese words for I will kill you, odd considering Neco's name sounded like Latin. One was obviously a normal gun that fired normal bullets. The other was special. It could fire a laser that at its highest concentration would shatter a mirror rather then be reflected by it. At its lowest concentration, it would merely stun someone. 

Neco threw himself onto his bed and sighed deeply. He was uncomfortably warm. "One thing I hate about being a fox…all this fur." He said aloud. His whole body was aching, he really did feel like he'd been through ten rounds with someone.

His ear twitched at the sound of his cell phone ringing. He groaned as he got up, his feet protesting at the feeling of having his weight put back on them so soon. He slowly dragged himself over towards his trench coat and reached into the pocket of it. He pulled out a grey cell phone. "Neco speaking." He said as he answered it. "Hey Neco, it's me Moon." A female voice said through the phone. "…You sound beat, what happened to you this time?" It asked, sounding concerned.

"Hey Moon." Neco responded, his mood brightening a bit at the sound of his best friend's voice. "I'll tell you later. It's a weird story involving me being zapped by a stupid gemstone." He finished. "Ouch." Moon's voice winced. "Need some company or something?" She asked. "I've got nothing better to do." "Sure, might as well. I was thinking about ordering a pizza or something later. Care for any?" He asked. "Sounds fine to me. I'll be there soon ok? Don't nearly shoot me when I knock on the door like you did that one time. I'll talk to you soon." She said as Neco heard her hang up. Neco chuckled at the memory of when she had came to visit him after he had gone through a mission that left him…jumpy you could say. The sound of her knocking had startled him so badly he had grabbed one of his guns and there were four holes in his door soon after. He felt really bad about that, but at least he beat his record for reloading it.

Placing the cell phone in his pant's pocket, he walked towards the small kitchen. He grabbed a glass and filled it with ice and water. He drank more then half of it in a few swallows and then placed the cool glass against his forehead, the cold making his headache die down. He set the glass down on the table and took his cell phone out again. He speed dialed his favorite delivery pizzeria, ordering what he usually had whenever Moon came over.

Once it was ordered sat down on a small but comfortable couch in front of a television set that was in fairly good condition. He had decided a short movie would be good for his nerves after nearly being fried to death. A knock came from the door. "It's unlocked." Neco called, laughing in his mind a bit as he heard whoever knock jump to the side after finishing knocking. The door opened and a rather normal looking female wolf walked in. She was wearing a loose fitting T-shirt and pants, along with knee high boots.

"You aren't going to shoot me right?" Moon teased him. Neco laughed a bit and shook his head no. "Feeling any better?" She asked as she closed the door. "A little bit." Neco answered, and then took another drink of water. He sighed and put his feet up on a padded foot rest that looked like it got a lot of use, even though Neco wasn't home very often. He began to tell her the events of what had taken place that night. "That's what happened to you!" She asked staring wide eyed. Neco nodded. "No wonder you look so beat up. You've gotta be more careful." She said. Then she took on a look of concentration.

"A hedgehog huh?" She said aloud. "Do you have a criminal profiler on the case yet?" She asked. She was a former criminal profiler for a police team until she had moved, and she had been a good one. Sometimes she would give Neco advice on criminals he was against, but it had been a while. Needless to say, her skills were itching to be used again. "Nah, the chief finally got smart and skipped using the ones at the facility." Neco said, noticing Moon's pride in her skills.

Moon got up and after some searching found some paper and a pen. "Ok, just start telling me what you know about what it looked like." She said. "Well, its quills stood straight out, and its body was completely black. Now here's the weird part, it had red irises, but no pupils what so ever." He said. Moon stopped her movements with her pen for a few moments. She didn't say anything, but decided to keep going. "It looked male, hard to tell. It almost looked like….it had a face that wasn't real. It looked like it wasn't…natural. It was strange…then again, I haven't been getting any sleep for the past week, and I was more concerned about stopping it then recognizing much more then that." He said.

Moon finished and put the cap back on the pen. "Something like this?" She asked, showing him a sketch. "Yep. As close to it as anyone can possibly get without having the real thing here." Neco answered. A knock came at the door. "That'll be the pizza." He said, getting up off the couch. He was feeling dramatically better in a short amount of time for some reason. He shrugged it off as he was getting used to this stuff.

At the door a tall and thin rabbit stood in the pizzeria's delivery boy uniform. He had the box in one hand and his ears were tied back like a hair tail or something Neco guessed. He handed the rabbit the credits for the pizza and took the box from him. Neco set the box down on the small slightly beat up coffee table he had between the couch and the TV.

"Wanna watch Pirates of The Caribbean?" He asked, opening the box and picking up a slice of the pizza. "Sure." Moon answered as she reached for a slice as well. Neco had previously placed it the cheap DVD player he had, so he walked over and hit the play button. Neco bit down into the pizza, only to immediately start drinking the rest of his water. ("You'd think I'd have learned by now not to bite down on the slice right after taking it out of the box.") He thought to himself. Moon laughed at him, then muttered "Ow." She moved something at her side before blowing on her slice of pizza and taking a bite. Neco could only guess one of the countless weapons she always kept hidden under her loose clothing had shifted and was poking her in the side or something.

* * *

In Station Square 

The city resembled nothing like it did about three years ago. All the buildings had been rebuilt and damages had been repaired. A very much overweight grey cat, whose stomach could rival a certain purple one that enjoyed fishing and had a frog for their best friend, sat behind the wheel of his large truck. He was stuck waiting at a red light, and yet there was no traffic around. He wasn't the smartest driver in the world and was anxious to get going. He looked to the left, no one there. He looked to the right, no one there. He gently eased off the breaks as the truck started to move foreword slowly. He was about to shift his foot the accelerator when a sudden blue blur passed before his vision, causing him to slam his foot on the break again. "What the-?" he said aloud as his cold coffee spilled across his dash.

The blur of blue that could rival that of the sky and sea kept running, only disappointed he didn't have enough room to break the sound barrier. He was getting bored now. Then he noticed one of the tall buildings just in his pathway. He smirked as he got an idea. Jumping of the ground and losing no velocity, his feet hit the side the building and started to slip, before he began moving them again, going straight upwards. The top was coming nearer and nearer. Just as he was about to reach it he jumped again, performing a combination of a summersault and a sideways twirl. His momentum carried him across the roof still in mid air. He landed on his feet on the opposite side of the building and raced the effects of gravity.

He jumped before hitting the ground, landing on his feet, then flipping to his hands, and back to his feet in order to slow himself down. He breathed heavily for a while, but still had a smirk on his face. ("Note to self, do that again sometime!") He thought. "Heh, what do you know, not only am I faster then a speeding bullet I'm also able to leap a building in a single bound." He said aloud after catching his breath. His emerald green eyes looked up at the building he had just run up and down. He then looked down at his own arm, pulling down one of his white gloves somewhat to look at the watch there. "Hmm…Might as well give Tails a visit." He said. Tails was over in Central city, a good ways away from Station Square, but then again, he had time, and he had the ability to travel at sonic speed. After all, he that wasn't his name for nothing.

* * *

Back in Central city, an hour later 

The two tailed fox with orange fur (despite it behind hard to tell since he was covered in oil stains currently) was working quickly and accurately as he was reassembling an engine that came from the Tornado 2, which was resting just a few feet away from him. He heard a faint sound heading towards him, something like a sonic boom. He smiled and averted his eyes long enough to see the familiar blue dot in the distance that was growing bigger and easier to tell what it was. He returned his gaze towards the engine block and picked up his tools again.

Sonic skidded to a halt in the small workshop Tails had created out of a storage area. "Hey." He said. "Hello." Tails responded as he kept working on the engine block. Tails had recently hit puberty and had a growth spurt, he was now only fractions of an inch shorter then Sonic himself. He had also started wearing tough denim overalls, though they made his two tails rather uncomfortable, and work gloves while working. He also had started to pick up his own sense of style, this included wearing a pair of special goggles that he had invented himself almost every waking hour. They both served as a safety goggles when doing things that could harm his eyes, and were piloting goggles that kept his eyes from drying out when flying. He'd added a couple of other neat features to them, but mostly he just kept them on because they looked good resting just resting above his eyes like that.

"Whatcha working on this time?" Sonic asked as he looked at the engine block. "The engine was wouldn't even start for some reason. I had to take the whole thing out and start taking it apart to find out that a stupid little rock somehow had managed to get itself jammed inside it. Now I'm putting it back together." He said. "I see." Sonic said, grateful that that the genius used plan and simple English to explain what he was doing.

The azure hero looked out the hanger-like door at the darkening sky. Lighting flashed every so often, reflecting off the tall building windows that were a short distance away. "You probably want to finish up for the night. A storms coming and I don't think either of us want to get caught in the rain." He said. Tails nodded and quickly made a few adjustments that would allow him to let the engine set there overnight without creating more work for him the next day. He quickly grabbed a rag and cleaned himself up before switching to his normal attire, which consisted of his good shoes and gloves, and his 'utility belt' as Sonic called it, considering it was one…or kind of at least, having several small pockets that contained random items Tails found useful to have around. The two then sped off.

They arrived at an apartment complex. They lived only a few doors away from one another, however both were in Sonic's name, considering Tails was still considered a bit young to own his own place. They stopped at Sonic's to chat for a while.

"I heard on the radio today, the third chaos emerald's been stolen now." Tails said. Sonic sighed. So many people had tried to use the power of the chaos emeralds for their own selfish reasons, most often Dr. Eggman, and it resulted in disasters. Why couldn't people just learn from others' mistakes and leave things alone? "Maybe I should go talk to Shadow, he probably knows something about it, or at least I can go bug him." Sonic said. Though things had quieted down somewhat, the two were still fierce rivals, always ready to challenge one another to a contest. Tails sighed somewhat, but agreed it was a good idea. "That reminds me. Last night, my emerald started acting funny. Like it was resonating with something. But before I could check it out it stopped." He said. "That's weird…Knuckles might wanna know that too." Sonic considered.

"Well, I'm gonna get some rest." Tails said stretching. "Yeah, me too. See-ya tomorrow buddy." Sonic said, messing up the fur atop his 'little brother' of sort's head. Tails smoothed it back down as best he could with one hand and gave Sonic a light jab in the shoulder as a comeback. Tails left and headed for his own apartment, ready for a good night's rest.

* * *

So, how'd you like it? Good? Bad? Tell me in your reviews! Remember, the more I get the sooner I'll update. Only suggestions to help improve the story allowed ok? I don't want any people telling me the story sucks without giving me a comment to help make it suck less that anyone capable of conscious thought would understand.  
Neco: …Why do I get the feeling the pain I have experienced early in this chapter is only a sample of what is to come?  
Because it is.  
Shadow: Ahem  
What?  
Shadow: Why am I only in the story for about a paragraph and then mentioned by that faker?  
Because, it's the first chapter. You'll be in the next one too ok?  
Shadow: You do realize my thousands of fans will kill you if I don't get some decent scenes soon…  
Listen, you're gonna get your fair share of the action eventually ok? Stop bugging me. And by the way, Sonic could beat you easily.  
Shadow: WHAT!  
You're a cool character, and your one of the ties for my second or third favorite, but while you're the ultimate life form, Sonic's got…well what makes him Sonic!  
Sonic: Can't argue with him on that. smirks  
Shadow: What do you mean second or third favorite….  
You lost some of your coolness percentage with that Shadow the Hedgehog game.  
Shadow: Someone is going to die for an ending like that! …I didn't even get to use my super form to full advantage…  
Damn good music in the game though  
Shadow: That it is, but not good enough to make up for so many holes in the plot.

That's all for now. Hit the pretty purple review button. And on a parting comment… _I'm telling you…When Shadow's jet skates come on he's moving slightly slower then he was just before they come on…  
_Neco: That's enough late night hours with caffeine and your gamecube for a while…


	2. Chaos Freqency Explained

Here we all are again. For the second chapter of Chaos Frequency: Text 1: Frequency Incomplete.

Neco: Why did you have to give the fic such a long name?

…You're questioning me?

Neco: …I'll just go sit in the box now.

Good idea.

Now, I just remembered I didn't give very good descriptions of the two OCs in the first chapter. So, I'll settle that now.

My character

Neco Indignus  
Fox  
Off white fur  
Silver eyes  
Black trench coat, tan pants, black boots.  
Normal Gun, Laser Gun  
His best friend is Moon  
His only living family is Eneco. (Eneco will be introduced later)

Kestril129's character

Silver Moonlight Nightsky  
AKA: Moon  
Wolf  
Silver fur  
Silver eyes  
Loose fitting clothing  
Countless weapons  
Her best friend is Neco  
Her sister Star (will be introduced later)

The next chapter will probably have Eneco and Star's bios.

* * *

Central City – 6:00 a.m.

Neco let his fist drop atop the source of the annoying electronic buzzing sound. He opened one eye to see his hand atop his digital alarm clock, the red numbers showing the current time. He groaned as he remembered that he'd forgotten to turn that off. He sighed and sat up, deciding to get some work done, despite the chief having given him the day off. He turned and rested his feet on the floor, shivering a bit at how cold it was. He headed for his bathroom and turned on one of the two silver knobs that controlled the water in his shower. After waiting a bit and then testing the temperature, he got in. Afterwards as was slipping on his boots, he grumbled to himself about how much time it took to get decently clean and then dry off with all of his fur. He also grumbled about how much shampoo it took to do so.

He grabbed a Pop Tart from his kitchen and ate it as he left, locking the door behind him. As he went down the stairs of the apartment complex, he wondered on what exactly to put on his agenda for the day. He decided to go to the museum that the emerald had been stolen from, seeing if going there would give him anything else that would help in this puzzling theft, and see how the forensic evidence investigators were doing. He walked along, noticing the puddles of water that had remained after the previous day's storm. He thought back to that night. Something was just unsettling about that hedgehog he saw. It didn't seem…natural. It looked…like its appearance was manufactured or something he decided.

The museum came into view, the line of yellow DO NOT CROSS tape sagged under the weight of the raindrops that had caught in it, and a cloth was visible above the broken skylight. Neco walked in, approved by security by showing his ID that showed his status as a member of GEM, the name spelled out fully. Neco looked around at the various species moving around, carefully cleaning up the area and collecting things. Some of them he recognized. "Hey, Neco." A robin called over to him. "I thought the chief gave you the day off." The robin continued. "Yeah, but I'm too stubborn to stay in bed, even if it means a chance at catching up on sleep I need desperately." Neco responded.

"Anyways, what have you found out so far?" he asked the robin. "Not a lot. There's enough signs to show you're telling the truth, but as for anything that we could use to identify the guy that took it…nothing." The robin sighed. "Look up there." He said, pointing to a spot on the wall. Neco did so and saw what looked like something had hit the wall, but not hard enough to break through. "We managed to figure out that's one of the spots he kicked off the wall by looking at the angles he would have taken to reach the top. Obviously it's strong to knock the grid down, but…anyways, not even a finger print around here. And it somehow broke the glass without cutting its hand, because there wasn't a trace of blood." The robin explained. "You're kidding. How the…Never mind." Neco said. This added to his list of questions about the mysterious thief.

* * *

Shadow stood atop one of the support towers of the city, his arms crossed as he watched the world below. "Tch, they live their lives so calmly, even though they know how fragile a life is?" He asked aloud. Then he shook his head. He didn't know why, but his own statement unsettled him. For some reason the thought of death, no matter how much a part of life it was, unsettled him. Perhaps that was why he found himself going out of his way without thinking about it to save the lives of the people in the city below. He looked up at the sky. The clouds of yesterday's storm had parted, and the blueness of it was clearly seen. Despite the blue of it reminding him of his rival, he still enjoyed the sight of the sky. Morning, day, night, it didn't matter. For some reason the sight of the earth's blue covering calmed him, as if he'd been waiting a very long time to see it like this, like he'd been looking at it from a different point of view and wondering what it would be like to see it as everyone else did.  
"You always did like dramatic poses." His ears registered an annoyingly familiar voice. "Not you again…" He sighed. "Nice to see you too Shadow." Sonic said sarcastically. "What is it you want?" Shadow asked, turning to face his blue doppelganger one could say. "I'm sure you've heard of the chaos emeralds being stolen." Sonic said, getting serious, a thing he didn't do very often unless the situation required it. "One was stolen two nights ago at the museum." He added. "I know, not my problem. If the city can't keep its hands on a single gemstone, then it shouldn't be left in their hands anyways." Shadow answered.

"Come on, you know what even a single chaos emerald can do. So what if it's not your problem? It could turn into it if you do nothing." Sonic said. "Heh." Shadow smirked. "What?" Sonic asked. "It's just I've never really seen you be so serious. Finally starting to use your head?" Shadow taunted. "Whatever. I'm just a little more concerned alright? The worlds been put in danger several times over in my lifetime over the chaos emeralds, It doesn't take a genius to realize the potential dangers of them being stolen." Sonic responded. "Fine, but if you're wondering if I know anything, the answer's still no. But if I feel like it, I may just look into the next situation if there is one." Shadow said. "So unless you want me to again show you that I'm superior to you, you can go now." He said, turning back to look at the city and folding his arms. "Yeah right! Like you could beat me!" Sonic said. Neither of them had forgotten their last race. They had both pushed themselves to keep ahead of the other so much that they had collapsed in exhaustion by the end of it, neither willing to agree to a tie.

* * *

Neco headed back to the facility, having nothing further to do at the museum. He decided to kill some time by practicing his aim. The target range in the facility was more like an arcade. Rather then shooting at paper drawings of figures and their vital areas or simple targets, they basically stood in front of an old shooting arcade style terminal with a fake plastic gun that was rigged to have to simulate the motions of reloading in order to actually reload it. Neco picked up the plastic toy gun and started a normal target practice program.

After a few minutes he had finished going through the simulation and was getting ready to start it again when he noticed that the others there had started to watch him. "…What's the matter?" He asked. "Check the record list." One of them answered. Neco sighed, the record list was basically a high score display. But, wondering what everyone was staring at him for, he did so. He blinked several times. The usual record that had remained untouched for little over a year was now pushed down to second, and atop it was Neco's name fallowed by a score that nearly doubled it. Neco couldn't believe it. He never paid attention to the score before, thinking it was just a way to get the new recruits to compete to out do one another, so he didn't realize how he was performing. He'd just been doing things as he normally did. Sure he noticed he'd been doing well this time, but nearly doing twice the record high? There just didn't seem any way it was possible.

Neco just shrugged. "Well…that's a surprise I guess." He said. He decided to run the program again, just to see if it was a fluke. He didn't pay attention to the score again, and put his full concentration on hitting each simulated target. He was doing even better, it looked like he was going to top his own score, but then something happened. He felt the same kind of pain he had felt when he touched the chaos emerald that night, but it was focused now upon his own vital areas. He half grunted, half cried out in the pain. Thankfully he was able to escape the pain when it forced him into unconsciousness. He fell to the floor, faintly hearing the concerned voices of others around him as he began to fall into darkness

He literally felt like he was falling, in a void of nothing. Eventually it stopped and was replaced with the feeling that he was laying on a thin mattress. He opened his eyes but instantly shut them and winced at the brightness of the light. From what he did manage to register, he was in a room of white and a soft mint green. His mind concluded that he was in the hospital a little ways away from the facility. "Is anyone there?" he asked. "Just me." He heard Moon's voice answer. Neco opened his eyes slowly this time, letting his eyes adjust to the light. "You alright? They said you fainted, but when they got you here the doctors said that other then some exhaustion, you seemed fine." She said. "Just pain is all…" Neco said, trying to make light of the situation. "Pass out from excitement about beating the record?" Moon teased him. "Heh." Neco laughed a bit. "How long was I out for anyways?" He asked. "A few hours." Moon answered him. "You should take it easy for the rest of the day like your boss told you too." She told him. "I'll be alright." He said, trying to get up out of the bed. His body protested the act of moving, but it was possible. However he soon fell to one knee. "Ok…rest is probably a good idea." He said aloud. "Told you, now get back in bed." Moon said to him before going over, helping him up, and setting him back in the bed. "Now get some sleep before I give you my version of anesthesia." She said, flexing her knuckles. Neco laughed but knew she really would knock him out if he didn't listen to her.

* * *

Tails had gotten up early to complete his work on the engine. He decided to spend some time researching the theft of the chaos emerald rather then start working on some of his more long term projects that included a new plane that he'd been devoting a lot of his spare time towards, and working on another plane idea that he just couldn't get to look right on the blueprints. He headed to the museum first, by flight of course. The area was covered in DO NOT CROSS tape, but they seemed to be finishing up there, and didn't seem to mind him being around. "Hey." He said, stopping a raccoon. "Do you know who was on guard when the chaos emerald was stolen?" He asked. The raccoon was about to tell him that it really wasn't any of his business, until he realized who he was talking too. "A guy named Neco Indignus. He works for the General Enforcement Militia." The raccoon answered Tails. Tails thanked him, and asked if he knew where this Neco was at the moment. "Dunno, last I heard he was headed back to the facility." The raccoon answered. "Where is that exactly?" Tails asked. The raccoon gave him directions and Tails again thanked him before flying off.

Tails entered and saw the small reception desk. He guessed they didn't deal with a lot of people very much. It would make sense considering they were a militia. A large male crocodile with brown skin sat at the chair, going through some paperwork. "Excuse me." Tails said politely gaining the crocodile's attention. "Where might I find someone by the name of Neco Indignus?" He asked. The crocodile shifted his attention from Tails to a computer nearby. After clicking and typing a few things, he answered Tail's question. "He's currently admitted to the Central city general hospital, room 114." He said. Tails looked shocked. "Don't worry, it says he's fine." The crocodile said, noticing Tails' expression. Tails nodded and thanked him.

Neco was sitting up in the bed, Moon had left earlier, but he knew if he got up and moved around she'd know…she always knew some how. ("…Just how is it she always knows anyways?") Neco thought to himself. There was a knock at the door. "Come in." Neco said. Tails opened the door and walked in. "Neco Indignus?" Tails asked. "That I am." Neco answered. He looked at Tails. "Unless one of those is a very good imitation, I believe your name is Miles Prower." He said. "Yeah, but call me Tails." Tails answered, explaining how he hated his real name. "I've come to ask you about the chaos emerald theft." He said. Neco nodded. "Sit down, this might take a while." He said to the younger fox. Tails grabbed a chair.

Neco explained everything that had happened from when the unknown hedgehog broke in to how he ended up in this hospital. Tails sat awestruck. "…You're serious?" Tails asked him. "Would there be a point to me not being?" Neco asked. Tails concluded no. Tails stayed silent for a few moments, then said "I'll be right back, I've gotta get something." He then raced out of the hospital. Neco blinked a few times, wondering what he was going to get in such a hurry. Tails in what felt like mere moments with a small device in his hands that had a roll of paper fed into it and what resembled an electronic thermometer. "If you would be kind enough as to let me have a sample of your blood, I'll explain what the heck this thing is." Tails said, seeing the look of confusion on Neco's face. "…Alright, but let's get a doctor to collect it ok?" He said. "Of course." Tails answered, not really trusting himself to handle a needle anyways.

After the doctor had collected the sample of Neco's blood, Tails had put a small amount of it into a beaker and placed the beaker so the end of the part of the device that looked like an electronic thermometer rested below the red liquid's surface. Tails then hit a small button on the device and the roll of paper started to move, pulled into the machine and coming out the opposite side. Tails stood up and turned to Neco, who was currently rubbing at the spot on his arm they had taken his blood from, and sat back down on the chair. "I have a theory, and if this thing proves it true, I'll tell you what it is." Tails said. And so Neco was still left puzzled by the strange little device.

Moon happened to walk into the room at that moment, looking …Ticked would be a word you could use that wasn't considered a cuss. She looked up and noticed Tails and confusion took over her expression. "Moon, Tails. Tails, Moon." Neco said, introducing the two to one another. "Ah." Moon said as she took another seat. "What happened?" Neco asked, knowing something did. "Well…" Moon began.

_Flashback to just after Neco fell asleep_

Moon watched as Neco slept on the hospital bed. She decided to leave and go about the rest of her daily activities and then visit him later. As she got up to walk over to the door, she saw something out the window on the building opposite the hospital. The figure of a black hedgehog standing atop the roof. She quickly ran out of the hospital, across the street, and up the building's stairs. The hedgehog looked over to her as she reached the roof. She halted. The hedgehog had no pupils, only crimson irises. She shook off the shock as the hedgehog started running. She pulled one of her concealed guns and started chasing the hedgehog. "Stop right there!" she yelled at it. It jumped off the edge of the building, reaching across to the other with ease. Moon fallowed it across several rooftops, eventually cornering it where the gap between the building roofs was to wide to jump across. "Nowhere to go now." She called to it. It looked at her, then over the building edge. Seeming to make up its mind it dove over the side and out of her sight. She ran towards the edge and looked down, but the hedgehog was nowhere to be found. "Damn it!" She yelled, stomping one foot in frustration. "Great, the hedgehog is a modern day Houdini." She muttered to herself as she concealed the gun again.

_End Flashback_

"So, it showed up again…" Neco said. "Damn it all…If only…Rgh!" He grunted in frustration. He sighed and closed his eyes. "Do you still have that sketch I gave you?" Moon asked. "Yeah." Neco responded. He opened his eyes to see what he was doing and went through his trench coat pocket, finding the folded piece of paper. "Here it is." He said, handing it to her. She didn't take it, she was too busy staring at him. "What?" He asked. "Your eyes…they just turned green…really green." She said. "What do you mean?" He asked. He got up and looked over in a mirror hung on the wall. Sure enough, staring back at him was his usual reflection, only his eyes were green. So green you could have sworn they'd glow in the dark. "Whoa!" He exclaimed in response to this. Not only were his eyes green, but he felt like his sense of sight had increased three times that of what it was. "This is weird…" he said, turning around. The he blinked again, rubbing his now green eyes. Tails looked the same…but different too…Like he could see both Tails and past Tails and into his very being. He saw…something powerful. "I'm starting to freak out here…" Neco said when he blinked and his eyes turned silver again, his vision restored to normal. "…That was creepy." He said

The device sounded with a small ding. Tails went over to it and read the strip of paper that had come out the other end with fine print written on it. "I knew it…" He said to himself. "Good, now could you tell us just what it is you know?" Moon said, getting impatient. "Sorry." Tails apologized. "This is a prototype of an invention I recently completed. It is designed to measure the presence of energy similar to that of the chaos emeralds." He explained. "It's not very well built, but it works. And according to it, you Neco have an energy in you that is almost identical to the chaos emerald's energy." Tails said. "What? How the…Wait, when I got zapped by the emerald when I went to pick it up…" Neco said, starting to realize what was going on. "Yes. I believe that when the emerald shocked you, it forced a large amount of its energy into you. You're lucky your body managed to absorb it, or you'd probably be dead right now." Tails said.

"But why did I feel like it was happening to me again today earlier?" Neco asked. "That's a good question, for that, we'll need to use the completed version of this thing." Tails said. "It's at my workshop in this city. If you're up to it we'll go there." Tails said. "I'm plenty rested, and don't argue with me this time Moon." Neco said, stopping Moon from protesting. "Fine. I'm coming too, I wanna see what this thing is." She said. "I just need to get my weapons. They probably confiscated them when I was brought in." Neco said. Moon produced his two guns. "I took them for you before they did, figured you'd want to save time." She said. "Thanks." Neco said as he took them from her and replaced them at his sides under his trench coat.

* * *

At Tails' Workshop

"It's in the back, hold on." Tails said as he let them in through the door. Moon looked around in grand interest at the many tools and parts that were around. Neco noticed the blue biplane bearing the two orange fox tails logo that resembled the letter T. "Ok, it's through this door." Tails said as he managed to shift the few objects that had managed to get in the way of the door. He led them through and turned on the lights. The room was considerably smaller and more cluttered. The machine he was talking about was basically a computer with a device attached to it that was most likely used to register the energy in the substances. Tails placed Neco's blood sample in a stand with clamps to hold it in place and lowered the device into it to register it. He then sat in the swivel chair placed in front of the computer. "This should just take a few moments." He said as he started typing. Sure enough he called them over to look at the screen seconds later.

"Ok, now I've found that chaos energy can be absorbed by those who have been around the chaos emeralds a lot, or have taped into their power, for example…" He said, clicking on something and causing a graph to come up, displaying his name and below it Sonic's. Next to each name was a jagged line that was moving like one of those devices that measured sound waves. "This line represents chaos energy as we'll call it." Tails said. "Neco, this…" Tails started, clicking something and adding Neco's name and a line next to it to the graph. "-Is what the energy level is in you." He finished. The line was moving more violently, but not nearly as high as the other two. "As for why you fainted that time, I think I know." Tails continued, clicking again. Sonic's name and line disappeared, leaving behind Tails' and Neco's. The two single lines divided into seven different colored ones. All of the ones next to Tails' name were moving in perfectly like mirror images of one another. Neco's hand only one line that was moving, the others not at all. "I found out the chaos emeralds act sort of like magnets to one another. I used this once to find the others, but that's not important right now." Tails began to explain. Normal magnets have a negative and a positive, so I figured there had to be something similar to the chaos emeralds power. I was right. While the emeralds together have one power, each one carries power that differs slightly from the others. Together they make a frequency you could say. These lines represent each part of that frequency." Tails continued. "Because you only have part of this frequency, it's starting to affect your body." He said. "...That explains it." Neco said, taking a while to register everything that was told to him.

"Is it life threatening?" Moon asked, concerned for her friend. "As far as I can tell, only if the frequency gets too much unbalanced." Tails answered her. "Well what can we do?" She asked him. "Not sure, I think if he could naturally start to absorb some chaos energy from the rest of the frequency, he might get better." Tails said, thought etched across his face. "…It's strange though…" He then said in an undertone. "What is?" Neco asked. "I did some experiments with plant and animal cells, most of the cells remained unaffected when it was introduced near them, and if it was forced upon them the usually decayed or died." Tails said, his face in deep thought. Moon's look of concern grew. "…Don't worry about it, I'll look into it myself." Tails said, shaking his head a little to clear his mind. "Right. Well, I should head home and rest before Moon hits me over the head with something heavy to knock me out." Neco said. Tails started to chuckle thinking it was a joke, but then stopped, seeing that Neco was serious.

After the two of them left, Tails looked at the six unmoving lines next to Neco's name, deep in thought. "…Wait a minute." He said, blinking a few times and he thought he saw them move upwards a bit on one spot. He closed the part of the graph with his name on it and increased the size of Neco's. The lines were moving but very little. "…But that doesn't make sense…He couldn't get this from just the one chaos emerald." Tails wondered aloud.

* * *

There you have it! Another chapter!

Neco: And you only had to stay up twenty minutes past midnight to do it.

…Shut up before I sent the flying kung fu ninja monkeys after you.

Neco: …If I didn't know you were crazy I'd think you were joking.

(A monkey in black clothing walks up)

You get the bananas afterwards I told you.

Neco: …I'll just stand here in the corner and ponder how I even exist.

Shadow: (tapping foot)

What?

Shadow: You only had me in the story for two paragraphs!

Don't worry, you're important to the story. Besides, that's a paragraph more then last chapter

Shadow: …You'd better start giving me bigger parts or you'll regret what will happen.

What? You'll send your thousands of fans after me?

Shadow: Worse, I'll make you watch the source of all evil.

NO! NOT THE PURPLE FOAM DINOSAUR THAT IS THE SOURCE OF ALL EVIL! (goes insane)

I want you all to review please. (big puppy eyes) I need reviews…If I don't get reviews the world will become a dark and very much unpleasant place to be…  
Neco: …Whatever higher power is listening, please help me!


	3. Moon kidnappedSonic VS Shadow

Hello for the third time. I've gotta start thinking of some funny greetings before I get many more chapters…

Neco: Or you could just stop writing these author's commentary things before and after each chapter.

…Have you not learned yet?

Neco: ...Should I go wait in the box?

No, not this time, I've got something else planned for you. Anyways, for all you Shadow fans out there, He's about to start getting some larger scenes now. Heck, he gets the first three paragraphs of this chapter.

Shadow: Finally some recognition. So, what do I get to hurt first?

If you're good, I might just make the chapter long enough to contain that Sonic VS Shadow battle I was planning.

Sonic: Bring it on! I'm bored anyways.

Shadow: You will feel my power crush you!

Sonic: No chance! I'll be gloating over your corpse in a matter of minutes.

Hey, leave it for the chapter you two.

Eneco: Ahem

Yes?

Eneco: …

Oh, yeah, that's right, you and Star's bios should be put up, since you're gonna be in the chapter if I can fit it in. Ok, here it goes

Eneco Indignus  
Fox  
Black fur  
Silver eyes  
Black trench coat, black denim pants, black boots (why the heck does he wear so much black?)  
Weapons unknown  
No friends  
Only living relation is Neco

Shooting Star Nightsky  
aka: Star  
Black fur with silver highlights  
Deep blue eyes  
Loose fitting clothing  
Carries concealed weapons, none of which are guns  
Friends with Neco  
Her sister is Moon

Ok, well, on with the chapter. (eats a cookie for no apparent reason) Beware, Sonic Heroes spoiler alert.

* * *

Shadow walked along in the dark alleyway ignoring the homeless that sat there, most of them asleep or not seeing him. This place was dark and concealed from sight, hidden from the rest of the people of the city. He needed to get somewhere that no one could bother him so that he may clear his clouded thoughts. Why was that theft of the chaos emerald weighing so heavily on his mind? He tried to push it from his thoughts, focusing instead on the pieces of his memory that eluded his grasp.

The first thing he could remember was waking up from that pod that seemed to be keeping him in something similar to a cryogenic status, and the female bat called Rouge standing there. Then the sound of gunshots as a robot activated, yelling out something about destroying all Eggman robots. He had almost smashed it when the bat came between them. She had asked him if he remembered anything, looking shocked to see him, as if she knew him somehow. He didn't ask her if she knew anything of his past, simply having someone tell him wouldn't be the same as actually remembering it. The robots name had turned out to be Omega. Rouge had forced them together to form a team as she called it. They chased after Doctor Robotnik, also known as Dr. Eggman. He seemed to know something that he wasn't telling, and Shadow couldn't help but be amused fighting his strangely made creations. Then they encountered that blue hedgehog, and fought him and his two friends…Yes…that felt familiar…battling that blue hedgehog that looked like his twin. Somehow this hedgehog, known as Sonic, was linked to his past. He was certain of it. What infuriated him most was that everything that Shadow threw at him, Sonic could throw back with nearly equal strength, not even seeming to take the fight seriously. No victor came of that battle, and there was none every other time the two fought, it always ended that way. He scowled at the thought of having someone as his equal in both speed and power. Then there was that metallic copy of his rival. Metal Sonic, who claimed to be the ultimate overlord. ("Tch, all that work to upgrade himself to that giant thing and he still was defeated.") Shadow thought. Indeed, Sonic had proven his abilities by using the power of the seven chaos emeralds and destroying the robotic monstrosity with ease. After the fight, Omega had taken Metal Sonic to tear him to scrap, he hadn't seen his new comrade since.

All this still didn't tell him what had happened to him before that…He did remember one thing though. Running down a long hallway along with a girl, a girl named Maria, then the sound of a gunshot. He had once thought the girl had died from the shot, but he grasped a piece more of that memory now, the shot had missed…but after that he didn't know what happened. He sighed, this was all confusing, and had kept him trapped in thought several times. He turned to head out of the alleyway, when he noticed something, a small violet colored light shined for a moment. "…There's no way…" He said aloud as he walked over to it.

* * *

Neco and Moon were walking back to the apartment complex from Tails workshop. "…You sure you're feeling alright?" Moon asked. "Even better then before I got zapped by the chaos emerald. Perhaps because I've been knocked out twice by the effects of it allowing me to get the sleep I needed." Neco said kind of laughing. "You worry about me to much." He said to her. "That's because you keep getting yourself into physical pain." Moon said smirking at him. "It comes with my job." Neco shrugged. They passed a newspaper bin and Neco inserted some change and took a paper. "…GUN found out about the thief being a black hedgehog…" He sighed as he skimmed through some of the articles. "They're trying to get Shadow the Hedgehog on the most wanted list now, even though they also got to see that profile sketch you did." He added. "I heard the leader of GUN has some sort of grudge against Shadow, strange considering how almost no one's ever actually seen him." Moon said. "Who knows, GUN's more like a military then anything. They usually want to take the most aggressive form of action." Neco sighed, folding the paper.

Something blue darted right by the two, the wind created by it nearly throwing the paper out of Neco's hands. "What the hell?" Moon said aloud as she blinked and rubbed her eyes. "…Well, now we know where our new acquaintance's friend is." Neco said, grabbing the sections of the paper that had escaped his grasp as the hedgehog had ran by, too quickly for them to get a good look at him.

Sonic came to a stop outside Tails' workshop. "Hey! You there Tails?" He called. "Yeah, come in, the door's unlocked." Tails' voice called back to him. Sonic walked in the door and looked around for some sign of his friend. "Where are you?" He asked. "In the back, over here." Tails answered him. Sonic fallowed the sound of his voice, leading him to a door that was halfway open. He saw the two tailed teenager sitting in front of the computer screen. "What's up?" He asked, knowing that Tails would normally be taking apart or putting something together rather then staring at a computer screen. "I went to find out more about how the chaos emerald got stolen, and met the guy that was guarding it at the time. You're not gonna believe this." Tails said as he started to explain everything Neco had told him and what he was looking at on the screen. "Whoa…This is just plain crazy." Sonic said after Tails had finished. "I know." Tails said.

"So where exactly are you keeping your emerald?" Sonic asked. "After I got it I started to keep it in a metal case with a lock. Seeing what the thief did to the museum when I was there, I put it in a stronger one, incase whoever it was figures out I have one." Tails said. "The case's here, I put it in with some of the toolboxes, figured it'd harder to spot that way." He continued. A knock came at the door. "…who the heck could that be?" Tails wondered aloud as he headed for the door.

Tails opened the door to have a fist ram into his face, sending him backwards several feet, thankfully landing clear of any objects that would endanger his health. He nearly muttered a swear as he got to his feet, rubbing the back of his head that had hit the ground as he fell. He looked up to see a pure black hedgehog in the doorway, with eyes that had no pupils. "Surrender your chaos emerald." It said in an artificial sounding voice, its face remaining indifferent. "I don't think so." Tails said as his posture shifted to a makeshift fighting stance he had gained through the adventures that he'd been though. Sonic had run out to see what happened. "What the? Who the hell are you?" The azure hero said as he put up his fists. "None of your concern. You will release your chaos emerald into my possession now." The intruder said.

"Not happening!" Sonic yelled. "You'll have to beat both of us to get at it!" Tails yelled as well. "Challenge accepted." The black hedgehog said. It darted towards Sonic, its leg drawn back to kick him in the torso. However, you don't run that fast without gaining a higher reaction time. Sonic saw the kick coming and dodged, aiming his elbow for the black hedgehog's gut, the hedgehog caught Sonic's arm and threw him away from itself. Tails raced forward, bringing his foot up to connect with the hedgehog's chin. The hedgehog stumbled back a few steps but seemed otherwise unfazed. Tails went in for another attack, but the hedgehog rammed its shoulder into the young fox, winding him. Sonic had recovered and was running towards the black hedgehog, his arm drawn back. His fist connected with the intruder's head, but he winced as it did, the black hedgehog not even reacting. "Man, this guy's head's harder then Knuckles'." Sonic said as he shook his hand a few times to relieve the pain. "Energy pattern of chaos emerald located." The black hedgehog said as it looked over to the bench where a metal container sat. Tails and Sonic dashed towards the container to block off the black hedgehog's path, but it easily threw the both of them aside. When it reached the metal case, it brought it fist down upon the top of the near two inches of metal that Tails had done his best to reinforce. "What the hell!" Sonic yelled as he saw the black hedgehog draw the yellow chaos emerald out of the remains of the case, not even a scratch on its hand.

"Chaos emerald retrieved. Will return immediate-" The black hedgehog was cut off as a short beam hit the hand that held the chaos emerald. The hand went limp as the emerald dropped to the ground. "Not this time." Neco said from the doorway. "We heard the noise and came back." Moon explained as she pulled two knives out. "…Unexpected. Retrieval time may be increased." The hedgehog said, still emotionless. It went for the fallen chaos emerald, but Sonic was faster. "This ain't yours buddy." He taunted the black hedgehog. Neco fired thrice at the hedgehog. However the hedgehog dodged each bullet barely but with ease. Moon ran at it, slashing at it with her knives.

The hedgehog back flipped away from them. It had in its hand a small switch. It hit the switch and a small beeping sound was heard. "That can't be good." Tails said as his eyes widened. A small explosion created a hole in the ceiling. The dust was clearing as the hedgehog snatched the emerald out of Sonic's grasp and ran for the new opening. ("Can't let him get away!") Neco thought quickly. His eyes suddenly turned green again as he fired at the hedgehog. If the bullet connect was unknown, as the area around the hedgehog suddenly exploded. The emerald again fell from the hedgehog's grasp. Neco felt very drained all of a sudden and fell to one knee. The hedgehog was still unscathed even after all this. "Stay down you!" Moon yelled as she slashed at it again. It grabbed her arm and twisted it, making her drop the knife.

The black hedgehog caught the knife before it hit the ground and held it against her throat. No one dared move for fear of it using the knife. "…That one has obtained an ability he did not possess before…Roger. Only specimen available nearby that does not currently contain chaos energy is the one held captive…Understood. Will return with captive for testing." It said as if speaking to someone else. "Let me go!" Moon growled and tried to break loose. "Resistance will only cause you more pain." The black hedgehog said in response to her demand. It flipped the knife around and hit a pressure point on her neck with the end of it, knocking her out cold. "Continue to retrieve chaos emerald?" It asked. "Roger, chaos emerald retrieval delayed." It said. It then jumped out the opening it had created, Moon trapped in its clutches. Sonic jumped through to fallow it, but it had disappeared from view already. "Damn it!" He yelled. "Lost him…" He muttered to himself angrily under his breath.

"We've…gotta find her…" Neco said as he breathed heavily. It was if someone had winded him when he had pulled the trigger that time. "You alright?" Tails asked Neco as Sonic jumped down through the hole again. "Give me some time…and I will be." Neco responded through heavy breaths. Sonic and Tails helped him to his feet. A female black wolf with silver markings on her body walked into the hanger, seeing as the door had been ripped off its hinges. The obvious look of what the hell happened here was on her face. "Excuse me…Is there someone named Silver Moonlight here? Goes by the name of Moon?" She asked. Neco's eyes were still green, and he could see the outline of three knives, a set of throwing stars, and a kunai with chain through her loose clothing. "What do you know about her?" Neco said, his hand instinctively going towards his guns, but stopped himself. "My name's Shooting Star, but I prefer to be called just Star. Moon's my younger sister." She said.

"…Excuse me for asking but why is there a hole in the ceiling?" She asked. Sonic sighed and walked over towards a window. "…She's been kidnapped by a black hedgehog." Neco said, looking down at the floor. "What! Who would kidnap Moon!" Star's face showing anger. "She carries enough weapons to arm an army unit!" She yelled. "The thing took one of her own knives and had it at her neck. She couldn't get out of its grasp." Tails said. Neco hit his fist against the wall. "I should have been able to do something!" He yelled at himself. "Hey, relax, it's not your fault. Even if you hadn't been weakened for some reason you couldn't have done something. It would have easily killed her if you tried something…All we could do is wait." Sonic said, showing signs of anger himself as he attempted to calm Neco down. "Why would someone take her though? What is it that made it take her and not one of you?" Star asked. "We don't know." Tails sighed. "Well, what's something that you three have in common that she doesn't, besides being male?" Star then asked. "…There is one thing…but how could it know that?" Tails said as he started thinking. "How would it know what?" She asked worriedly, looking at the three of them. "This is going to take a while to explain. Take a seat." Sonic said.

Between the three of them, they were able to retell everything that had happened to her. "So the thing took her to put chaos energy into her!" Star asked in distress. They nodded. "…Just how dangerous is that?" She demanded to know, staring directly at Tails. Tails looked towards the ground and said in a quiet voice. "There's a good chance she won't live through it." Star let out a deep growl. "If they kill my sister…" She said, taking out one of her knives. "They will regret it…" "But where do we even start looking?" Sonic brought up. "…I've got it!" Tails said, his mood brightening. He went over to a pile of boxes and parts that rested on a counter, shifting through them until he found what he was looking for. He produced what looked like a GPS. "This is the sensor I built to detect the chaos emeralds." He said, blowing the dust off it. "If they've stolen the chaos emeralds, and are intending to put chaos energy into Moon…" Tails began. "Then that means that you could use that to locate the emeralds and with them the thief and Moon!" Neco finished. "Exactly. Now let's see if I can get it to work again." Tails said as he started to fiddle with it.

It came on, showing a map and several dots around the edges, one being in the center along with an arrow. "…No way." Tails said. "What?" Star asked. "There are more then seven markers for the chaos emeralds on this…" Tails said. A quick glance was enough to show that it was true. "Is it malfunctioning?" Sonic asked. "No…It doesn't seem to be…" Tails said as he inspected it. "We don't have time for this." Neco reminded them. "He's right. We'll just go to the nearest one first." Tails said. He hit a button to zoom the map out. "…It looks like the nearest one is in Station Square, near the area they didn't rebuild after Chaos Perfect attacked." Tails said. "Alright, I'm there!" Sonic exclaimed as he ran out of the workshop.

"Come on, best way to keep up with him is in the Tornado 2." Tails said as he picked up the chaos emerald from off the floor and walked over to the blue bi plane. He hopped in the front seat and slipped his goggles down over his eyes. "I'm sorry that it doesn't more then one passenger area. It's just that I usually don't have to worry about several people." He said to them as they both climbed in. They were cramped, but managed to keep inside well enough. "Ok, here we go." Tails said as he grinned. The engine roared to life and slowly pulled forwards. Tails hit a button and a garage door opened up, just big enough to allow the plane to go through with ease. There was more then enough street for the plane to take off, and soon they were high above. "It won't take long to reach Station Square, so don't worry." Tails told them.

* * *

Station Square, one hour later

Tails landed the plane with experienced ease and hopped out. The area was still very much damaged, some of the buildings collapsed and the others hardly standing. "Over here!" Sonic signaled to them. The group joined him, Tails handed Sonic the chaos emerald, just in case. "You think Moon's here?" Star asked. "Possibly. This place is abandoned, so it's a good spot to hide something." Tails said. "Where exactly is the emerald?" Neco asked Tails. "…We don't need that for this emerald, I can see where it is." Sonic said, looking atop one of the buildings. Everyone else fallowed his gaze to see a black hedgehog…but this one wasn't the one that had attacked them before. Sonic ran towards the building and jumped, landing on its side and running straight up. He reached the top in no time. "Twice in two days, that's gotta be a record for how often I see you." Sonic chuckled. "Do I ever get peace from you?" Shadow asked. In his right hand was the purple chaos emerald. The same color as the first one that had been stolen. "Where the heck did he get that!" Neco wondered out loud.

"Shadow, where'd you get the chaos emerald?" Sonic asked. "Found it in an alley." Shadow said simply. "Shadow, that emerald is one of the ones that have been stolen. You've gotta hand it over. You're probably gonna have to answer some questions too." Sonic said to him. Shadow thought for a while. He wasn't really sure what to do at the moment. Then he decided. "If you want the emerald faker, then try and defeat me." Shadow said before taking off running, jumping across to the next building. Sonic smirked. ("Should have seen this coming.") He thought. "You're on!" He yelled and chased after Shadow.

The two of them were moving at the same speed, the distance between them neither shrank nor grew. They kept running faster and faster. ("This is no good, if we keep up like this we'll just wind up running in a circle.") Sonic thought. Then he remembered something. ("I like just plain running better. But I'm not letting Shadow get away.") He thought. Light grew around him as he gripped the chaos emerald Tails had handed him earlier tightly. He focused the power he could feel coming from it. "Chaos Control!" He yelled. The light flashed brightly as he vanished and then reappeared right in Shadow's path. The two hedgehogs collided with one another, but quickly recovered and started running again.

"Isn't there a way to end this? Preferably before my sister gets killed!" Star yelled. "You wanna try and get close enough to the two of them to ask them to stop, be my guest." Neco said, not tearing his gaze away from the battle. "Besides, that emerald was one of the ones that were stolen. And if Shadow found it, then it might help point us in the right direction to find Moon." He added. "I just wish that this'd get over with soon. I don't like waiting." Star said, her voice showing her annoyance and concern.

"Chaos Control!" Shadow yelled, appearing behind Sonic and tripping him over the edge of the building. Sonic was falling towards the ground when a flagpole conveniently came into view. He grabbed onto it with one hand, swung himself around and let go, the momentum carrying him back up towards the top. Their speed was increasing constantly. Shadow decided to pull out a few stops. He would not settle for equal to anyone. He focused his power towards his hand. "Chaos...Spear!" He yelled, flinging his hand diagonally, instead of a single spear of light being thrown, this action caused him to throw several. Though each was considerably weaker then using a single spear, they were more accurate and likely to hit his target. Sonic however was familiar with this trick of Shadow's. He rolled underneath the spears, causing them all to miss him entirely. Sonic then flung himself into the air. Using his homing attack he hurtled at Shadow. Shadow having had to slow down to use his chaos spear attack, could only brace himself as the full force of Sonic's homing attack sent the both of them through the building's roof.

"Does this always happen?" Star asked. "Usually by now the two of them are moving to fast for me to keep up with. Right now they're more focused on attacking one another then moving faster then the other." Tails said. Neco just watched as the two displayed their strength in combat against one another.

"Sonic Wind!" Sonic yelled, deciding to get payback for having to dodge the chaos spear. Blue winds at beyond gale forces were aimed at Shadow. Shadow jumped over them, landed on his feet, and then hurled himself forward to elbow Sonic in the stomach. Sonic was pushed against a wall, but recovered quickly. He ran at Shadow, his arm drawn back as if he was going to give Shadow the same treatment he got, but shifted to a downwards strike before Shadow could react, his fist connecting with the top of Shadow's head, forcing Shadow to collide with the ground. Shadow grabbed Sonic's ankle and threw him upwards before getting back on his feet. Sonic twisted in midair, landing easily. Sonic smirked. "Wanna go faster?" He asked Shadow. "Just try and keep up with me." Shadow answered.

"Should we try and look around for something while they're both busy trying to kill one another?" Star asked. Neco nodded. "Yes, that would probably be a good idea." He said, right before Tails yelled "WATCH OUT!" grabbing the both of them and flying several feet into the air. Tons of rubble fell as the building the two hedgehogs were in collapsed, filling the space the three of them had just occupied.

* * *

Cliffhanger!

Sonic: What? You let us get into a cool battle and then end it with a cliffhanger!

Shadow: (is seriously ticked)

Please don't kill me, you'll find out who wins in the next chapter! Threaten the reviewers! The more reviews I get the faster I'll update it ok!

Shadow: (puts down the big gun thingy he was about to kill me with) Alright…

Knuckles: …Why am I not in the story yet?

You're going to be, just hold on. (sighs) everyone wants to get into the story sooner…

Neco: What is it that you're going to do to me for the thing before the chapter anyways?

Oh just a little television… (ties Neco to a chair and turns the television on to Richard Simmons workout thingy)

Neco: AHHHH! IT BURNS MY EYES!

If you want him to feel any mercy, review…please, so I can turn the evil thing off…(eats ice cream for no real reason)


	4. Battles and Eneco revealed

Well, I haven't gotten any hate reviews yet for that cliffhanger…of course I haven't gotten any reviews for that chapter at all yet.

Neco: …

No comments this time Neco?

Neco: You're insane…

You say it like it's a bad thing

Neco: IT IS A BAD THING!

Normality is an abnormal state of being, so ha!

Neco: That doesn't even make sense!

Yes it does. …Wait, how did you get out of the chair and turn the television off?

Neco: Umm…

(duct tapes Neco's mouth shut because I'm running out of ideas of what to have him say)

Knuckles: What about me?

Take it easy, your gonna get in soon too, alright? For the love of something lovable…  
Rouge: …  
Not you too…You'll show up same chapter or one right after that Knucklehead does

Cream: Mister Shin?

Cheese: Chao?

…Please, I'm even less mentally stable right now then I normally am. Just let me get a chapter done where no one pesters me about getting in the story other then just a paragraph.

Shadow: Shut up and start typing so I can find out how badly I kick Sonic's blue ass.

You want I should put your life in jeopardy in the story?

Shadow: You wouldn't dare…

I have the power to, I'm the one writing this fanfic

Shadow: …

Good. Now stand over there and attract reviewers or something

Now for those of you out there, read the chapter and review please.

Unknown location, 15 minutes after Moon was captured

* * *

Moon slowly awoke. She blinked a few times as he eyes adjusted to the low level of light. There were several forms of black hedgehogs moving around, each of them with red eyes lacking pupils. She tried to get up, only finding that she was bound to some sort of table. "Where the hell am I?" She whispered to herself. "Members of group #8 5 4 7 5 8 15 7, move subject #19 9 12 22 5 18 13 15 15 14 12 9 1 8 20 to group #6 15 24." A mechanical voice came from what Moon assumed was an intercom. Several of the hedgehogs grabbed the table she was bound to and wheeled it down a hallway that was completely cut off from light. The hallway ended leading into another room like the one she was in previously, except instead of hedgehogs moving about performing various tasks, this one was filled with the forms of black foxes with the same eyes that lacked pupils. One walked towards her. It stood out among the others, mostly because it had on a long black trench coat, and had normal silver eyes. "Neco? Is that you? Untie me!" Moon called to him. The fox laughed lowly. "I suppose I do resemble him don't I?" It said in a cold voice. Moon's eyes focused and noticed that the fox had black fur, but unlike the others that seemed like a lifeless color, this one shined a bit in the dim light. The fox blinked and its eyes changed. But unlike Neco's that turned a bright green, this fox's eyes turned a sickening blood red color. Moon struggled against the bounds that held her to the table. "You'd best stop that…you're going to be here for a while." The fox said as it turned around and walked away from her.

"Let me go now!" Moon growled as she glared at him. She kept struggling as she yelled "What do you want with me!" The fox kept walking until he was standing next to the control panel to some machine in the room. "We're just going to run a few experiments." The fox said to her without turning around. He signaled to the other foxes with a hand gesture and they started to carry vials full of some glowing gel like substance towards the machine and inserted them into it. Moon growled louder. "What is that stuff! Why are you doing this and who the hell are you!" She yelled at him. The fox slowly turned around to face her. "Must you ask so many questions?" He sighed. "One, that gel is a special substance that can contain types of energy so that they do not dissipate into the air, it's currently containing the same type of energy the chaos emeralds generate. Two, you remember how when your friend fired upon one of our units the area around it combusted? He somehow gained the ability to do that through the shock he received from the emerald, we're using you to experiment how chaos energy can affect a specimen, and you were the only one available that did not currently contain chaos energy within them. I suggest you hope that the chaos energy does not kill you. It's a rather messy process of trial and error. And three…well I'm technically not aloud to tell you who I am." He said to her.

A glass shielding came down around the table she was on, as well as a mechanical spire of sorts that had a crystal lens at the end of it. Moon struggled greater. "Let me go! I demand that you release me!" She growled, fear starting to fill her voice no matter how hard she tried to hide it. The spire was fully lowered as the one fox started to hit commands on the control panel. Energy was being focused into the crystal lens as the force behind it grew stronger. Finally the energy passed through the lens and into Moon. Moon let out a loud shout of pain. She started screaming as the intensity slowly rose, then she started snarling and growling. She was acting more as a wild wolf would as she let out a howl of pain. The fox smirked as he watched the results, it was a cold smirk of satisfaction. He turned the machine off and cut the energy current. "That's enough for now…I don't think it would be a good idea to kill the specimen by trying to force too much energy into it at one time. Get a containment unit here and move her to a cell." It said to the other foxes.

Moon fell limp breathing heavily. "Release me…" She growled at him as he approached the glass shield. "No, not yet. Don't worry, we'll give you a chance to move about soon. But for now you're going to sleep." As he was saying this a thick vapor filled the glass shield. Moon tried to hold her breath, but the gas managed to enter her lungs. She fought against sleep, fighting a losing battle. Eventually she was forced into a heavy drugged slumber.

* * *

Station Square, present time

Sonic and Shadow had began to use light dash attacks against one another. One could only register their movements if they were able to slow the passage of time itself. The force that was being created by the speed of their movements was enough to literally rip the support beams down as the passed them. The building of course collapsed without the support beams. The two of them used chaos control to escape the rubble from crushing them. Thankfully the surrounding building's supports did not give out as well as the rubble fell upon the outside walls. "Are they trying to get someone killed!" Star yelled clinging to Tails' hand as he slowly decreased altitude and the three of them were able to rest their feet on solid ground again.

The two of them breathed heavily as they stared each other down, neither even blinking. They for once walked towards one another. They stopped with about a yard and a half apart. Neither said anything. Then suddenly Shadow was in front of Sonic, throwing punches as Sonic blocked using his own fists. As Shadow threw another punch Sonic dodged it and grabbed Shadow's wrist. He threw Shadow over his shoulder and onto the ground. Shadow rolled out of the way of a downwards kick aimed at him and shoved himself back up. The two of them then started to just exchange blows, the fists flying as quickly as their feet did earlier. They didn't bother to block, they simply kept lashing out in any way they could think of. Finally the two jumped apart, then started to run yet again. Shadow light dashed at Sonic, nailing him in the back and making him bounce along the ground as his momentum carried him. Sonic slowly got to his feet. Shadow wasn't holding back. Even though his body was becoming fatigued, he smirked. He was enjoying pushing himself to his limits against his rival. But he also noticed the damage their fight was causing. He had to end it now.  
"Hey Shadow, how about we just finish this now and save ourselves some time?" He called over. "Fine by me!" Shadow called. "Chaos Control!" He yelled as he vanished in the flash of light. Sonic smirked as he knew just what to do. He began a light dash attack, but then activated the emerald's power to chaos control in the middle of it. The two hedgehogs both reappeared, their backs to one another. "…Cheap…shot." Shadow muttered as he fell forwards and hit the ground out cold. "Thought you'd… say that…" Sonic said as he did as well, but remained conscious.

Neco and Star walked over towards Sonic. "Heh…I guess I over did it a bit huh?" Sonic chuckled as he looked around at the large fragments of the building that had come crashing down. "You think!" Star said, the irritation obvious in her voice. Neco helped Sonic to his feet and moved the victorious hedgehog over to one of the standing buildings, resting him against its wall. Tails went over to Shadow and reached for the emerald in his hand. However it suddenly started shining brightly, the light quickly diminished however and the emerald turned a dark grey color. It cracked, then shattered into dust sized particles. "…So it was a fake..." Tails said as he looked where the gem had been seconds earlier. "Great, we wasted all that time and the thing's fake!" Star yelled. "Calm down. Shadow may still know something." Sonic said after catching some of his breath.

Neco looked over towards one of the buildings. "…We've got company." He said. He took out his gun and fired at one of the windows. The glass shattered and fell, revealing a black cat with red eyes that lacked pupils. "A cat too!" Tails yelled. "Data gathered, will return." It using the same monotone voice that the hedgehog had used. "Hold it right there." Neco said to it. "I've got a few questions for you." He drew forth his second gun. "Subject showing signs of hostility. Course of action suggested?" The cat said. "Understood, will engage subject in combat." The cat jumped through the broken window and landed a few feet away from Neco. "I'll handle this. Get the emerald and Shadow back to the Tornado 2." Neco said to the others. Tails nodded and grabbed Shadow's wrists while Star grabbed his ankles, the two of them managed to move him with ease. Sonic still holding the emerald got to his feet and fallowed them. "Alright cat, where did the hedgehog take Moon?" Neco asked it. "Requested information denied." The cat answered. "Then I'll have to force it out of you." Neco said as he took aim.

* * *

Unknown location, present time

Moon groaned as she slowly opened her eyes, wishing she had stayed asleep. "Where am I?" She wondered out loud as she looked at the holding cell she was in. "Specimen #19 9 12 22 5 18 13 15 15 14 12 9 1 8 20 has awakened." Came the same mechanical voice from before. A robotic arm reached out from the side of the cell and grabbed a hold of Moon's arm. Moon struggled to get loose from the bindings that still held her in place as well as the robotic arm. "Get this thing off me!" She yelled. The arm attached something similar to a cuff used to measure blood pressure to her arm and then retracted.

"Show yourself you stupid coward!" She yelled, trying to get the black fox's attention. "Sorry to disappoint you, but I'd prefer to avoid getting killed by an unforeseen situation." The fox's voice sounded in the cell over an intercom. A small monitor lowered from the ceiling. It turned on, the sound of static electricity dancing across its screen as the image of the fox came into view. "What are you doing to me! Why do I feel so strange!" She yelled at him, her face showing the deep anger in her. The fox looked down at a small gauge. The needle on it was slowly rising. "I'm just recording some data." He said calmly. "Who are you!" Moon demanded again. "If you wish to know so badly, I'll give you the only hint I'm allowed too." The fox said smirking. "By those around here, I'm referred to as #5 14 5 3 15." He said.

Moon growled in anger as she tried to figure out the vague clue the fox had given her. He was infuriating her without even really trying. She winced. She felt pain in her mouth and figures. She looked down to see her claws were growing. Running her tongue over her teeth, she found that her fangs were as well. The pain was growing, starting to spread throughout her body. "What's going on!" She asked in panic. "Yes…As we hoped. The change is delayed more then we wished, we'll have to work on that." The fox said, taking out a small notebook and writing something down on it. "What do you mean? What the hell's happening to me!" She yelled. "Answer me!"

"You should pay more attention to that clue I gave you." The fox said, not looking up from the notes he was writing. Moon's growls became deeper, more primal sounding, and her eyes grew dark. "Your name…it's Eneco, I've seen it somewhere before." She managed to say. The fox looked up. "Indeed. My name is Eneco." He said. "Perhaps your friend Neco told you about me…then again, perhaps he doesn't trust you enough." His eyes were still that horrifying blood red color. Moon continued to struggle, thrashing about and snarling like a trapped animal. "What do you mean!" She demanded. "He probably detests how you're always fallowing him around and worrying about the smallest thing wrong with him." He continued.  
Moon let out a loud snarl as the ropes holding her broke and she smashed the monitor. She tried to destroy the barricades keeping her within the cell, losing control of her own actions and acting like a wild animal. "Good, very good. Total transformation time took longer then desired. Perhaps an aggression steroid or another charge of chaos energy could remedy the delay. I shall consult with him. But first, we don't want her to harm herself attempting to get free." The fox said as he hit a button on the control panel. The same gas from before filled the containment cell. Moon stumbled and fell into a drugged sleep once more.

* * *

Station Square, current time

The cat ran at Neco. Neco quickly fired both guns at the cat. They would normally be impossible to dodge at that range, but the cat did somehow, faster then Neco could see the cat had landed on its hands behind him and kicked him in his back. Neco managed to keep on his feet, but still stumbled, giving the cat a chance to attack again. The cat somehow got around Neco and flung its fist into his face. Neco was knocked off of his feet and landed on his back. The cat walked towards him slowly. Neco swung his body around, catching the cat's leg with the curve of his foot and tripping it. He got to his feet and was ready to strike the cat, only to find it had vanished from view again. "What's going on here? …" He whispered to himself as he looked around. The cat came down from above, its foot colliding with Neco's skull. Neco hit the ground again. The cat grabbed a fistful of Neco's coat and threw him towards a building. Neco managed to get his hands ahead of him, taking most of the force of the collision away from the rest of his body. "Damn, how does it keep attacking me when I can't see it?" Neco wondered aloud.

Neco was suddenly punched in his side, and then hit from behind again. "Ugh! Neco grunted. He hadn't managed to land a single hit on his opponent and the cat was landing attacks left and right.  
("It has to be moving outside of my vision somehow…") Neco thought as he kept his guard, looking around. He closed his eyes and focused on his other senses. ("If I can't see it, maybe I can find it some other way…") He thought. There was nothing for several moments, only the slight sound of the wind. ("Getting nervous…This could be a tough fight if I don't find a way to locate my enemy quickly.") Neco thought as he kept his eyes shut. Then his ear flicked as he heard something. It was quiet, almost like the ghost of a sound, but it was there, something moving through the air and fast, coming from right ahead of him. He opened his eyes and spotted the cat moving right for him. "Gotcha." Neco smirked as he flung his fist at it, landing right on the cat's chin. The cat flew backwards but flipped in midair landing on its feet and hands soundlessly. It jumped to one side and out of Neco's vision, but this time something was different. Neco turned his eyes to fallow it and managed to catch glimpses of its movements. Neco's eyes were slowly filtering to a green color once more. ("It's only a little, but I can keep up with the cat's movements.") He realized. He also noticed something, a faint tingle of something throughout his body as he tracked the cat's movements. Neco managed to make a connection. ("Is this something I gained from the chaos emerald?") Neco thought as he managed to block a fierce kick from the cat and shoved it away from him. ("Regardless if it is or not, it's giving me the edge I need.") He thought.

("The cat tries to move to my blind spots, so it looks like it's disappearing, but it's just keeping itself out of my line of sight.") Neco thought as he watched as much of what he could catch of the cat's movements. The cat noticed its movements were starting to be noticed, so it decided to stop sneak attacking and attack full force. It dropped down right in front of Neco and ran at him. Neco was confused by this sudden change in tactics and received a punch right to his ribcage. He doubled over, winded by the powerful blow, and the cat kicked upwards at his head, knocking him backwards. Neco flew yards by the force of the kick, he was lucky to still be conscious. He slid along the concrete ground, finally coming to a halt. He swore as he got to his feet, he wasn't doing well in this fight. He looked over and saw the Tornado 2, Tails and the others still waiting to take off. He suddenly got an idea.

"Tails! Toss me the chaos emerald!" Neco yelled at the younger fox with two tails. "What?" Tails said in confusion at the sudden demand. "I said give me the emerald!" Neco yelled again. Star growled at Tails' hesitation and snatched it from him. "Catch!" She yelled, throwing it right at Neco. Neco dove and caught it. He could feel the warm pulsations coming from the gem. He could tell that this single emerald contained the potential to do both good and evil, and he currently felt it reacting to his emotions. The positive power of the chaos emerald was more then enough for his intentions. As if some foreign instinct was guiding his actions, he drew his laser firing gun and aimed at the cat currently speeding towards him. The warm energy flowed through him, focusing on the gun in his hands. Something changed about the gun for only moments as he pulled the trigger. A massive continuous beam of multi colored energy was released from the gun. The cat only having seconds to react shifted into a defensive stance as the beam engulfed it completely. The beam finally died down and Neco fell to one knee. He smirked and laughed a bit between heavy breaths. "Whoa…that was cool." He said as he tried to give his lungs the much needed oxygen the rest of his body was yelling for.

The cat remained, damaged but standing. It was strange, it looked like it had been affected by the blast as a machine would be. "Critical damage received. Estimated 47.6 percent of total systems received damage. Suggested course of action?" The cat said, still emotionless. "Understood, returning for repairs now." It said, before jumping backwards and then disappearing as if it was slowly blurred out.

"What the hell was that thing anyways?" Star slowly asked. "Absolutely no idea…" the teenage genius fox answered. "A little help?" Neco asked. "I'm not sure if I can stand on my own to be honest." He said in a tired voice. "No problem." Sonic said, having recovered over the course of the fight. Surprisingly, Shadow was still out cold. Sonic extended his hand, which Neco gladly took. Mindful of his quills, the blue hedgehog pulled Neco's arm over his shoulders to support most of his weight. "Thanks." Neco said. "No problem. What was that thing you did anyways? It was sweet!" Sonic said, his usual attitude restored to its full glory. "Dunno." Neco answered honestly. "…Sonic, whenever you use the emerald's power…do you feel like your fatigue's gone and basically…a raw warm power surge through you?" Neco asked. "Heh, yeah sometimes. You only felt the strength of one emerald though." Sonic said. "I won't bore you with details on how I did, but whenever I use the power of all seven of them, it's like my strength is limited only by my desire." He said. "Which usually means I'm basically undefeatable." Sonic smirked then. Neco laughed a bit. Sonic was a rather amusing person to talk to, self confident and determined.

"Would the two of you hurry up so we can find my sister before something kills her!" Star yelled at them. "We're coming! Never thought I'd say this, but hold on!" Sonic yelled at her. "We should head back to Central city. We can't just do this on our own anymore. I didn't want to have to, but I think it's time we informed the rest of GEM about this situation." Neco sighed. "First we've got a smaller problem. I've got to pilot the Tornado 2, and Shadow can't move on his own right now. Someone's gonna have to travel on foot with Sonic." Tails said. "I'll come with you, I'll be able to make sure Shadow doesn't fall out or something." Star said. "That's a good idea. Don't worry, I can easily get back to Central city in no time at all even carrying Neco here." Sonic smirked. "…How exactly do you intend to do…" Neco started as Sonic shifted his hold on Neco's arm. "THAT!" He yelled as Sonic took off running, the speed lifting Neco off his feet, preventing him from being dragged along. "…I hope Neco's still in one piece by the time we get back…" Tails said as he watched.

* * *

Somewhere above the road between Station Square and Central City

Star looked down at the unconscious black hedgehog she was keeping a hold on to make sure he didn't fall out of the small bi plane. He almost appeared to still be scowling even when out cold. As if something plagued him even in his dreams. She couldn't help but wonder what he'd look like if he actually smiled. Not a smirk or laughter of triumph, but a genuine smile. She then blushed a bit, realizing she was thinking about a hedgehog that had just caused a building to collapse and nearly flatten her. She shook her head to clear her thoughts, only to realize that her hand had started to run through the patch of softer white quills on his chest. She withdrew the hand, staring at it as if it had taken on a life of its own.

* * *

Central city, one hour and fifteen minutes later, at GEM headquarters.

Neco was still considerably light headed from being carried along the way to central city at near sound speed. He showed his ID to the brown crocodile at the desk and gestured towards the others, showing they were with him. The crocodile nodded and went back to paperwork. Neco led them past offices and a couple of meeting rooms, finally stopping at one office next to a heavy metal door. Neco knocked on the office door, ignoring the metal one. "It's open." A deep voice answered within. Neco turned the handle and walked in, ushering in Tails and Star. Sonic had stayed outside to keep an eye on Shadow. (Who still hadn't waken up…or maybe he started to and Sonic hit him with something, who knows) The chief was sitting at the desk, looking through files. "Hello Neco, what is it?" He asked, not really noticing the two others that had walked in. "We have a situation." Neco said. The chief looked up and noticed the other two. "What do you mean?" The chief asked. He gestured towards some seats as they all started to explain what had happened.

The chief didn't believe what he was hearing. Fake chaos emeralds? More of these strange people that lacked pupils? Something strange happening to Neco? It overwhelmed him. He sighed and rested his hand against his forehead. "Neco, this is hard to believe." The chief said. "It's all true sir." Tails said. "I didn't say I just because it was hard to believe I didn't." The chief said. "So you see, this might be more then a single kidnapping." Neco said. "…We'll question the hedgehog, then decide on a course of action." The chief said. "Understood." Neco answered him.

* * *

There you go, another chapter.

Shadow: What the hell! I lost!

Sonic: Ha! Take that!

Shadow: And what the hell is that wolf doing to me!

Heh heh heh, it's the start of another part of the story.

Shadow: I'll kill you!

By the way Shadow, your life will most likely be put into jeopardy, but you'll probably bust out a cool new move at the last minute or something.

Shadow: …you get to live for now…

Eneco: Finally, I'm in the story.

Knuckles: But I'm not! (cracks his knuckles)

CALM DOWN! BEFORE I TAKE AWAY COOKIES AND MILK TIME!

Knuckles: (grumbles about being quiet)

Now review my loyal subjects, and I might not be getting chapters up as quickly since school and stuff gets in the way.


	5. Enraged Moon and Angel Island

Happy Winter-een-mas reviewers!

Sonic: What the hell is that?

Neco: It's a made up holiday for video games in one of the web comics he reads that takes place in the last week of January.

SILENCE! (a pixilated hammer hits Neco over the head)

Neco: OW! WHAT THE F (censored)!

Sonic: Should have known better…

Knuckles: He's just upset that he has to get braces. (laughs at me, is suddenly locked in a room with an unbreakable television set to some annoying educational kids show on it) NOOOO! LET ME OUT!

…Anyone else wanna make fun my stupid teeth?

Sonic: … (shoves Shadow forwards) HE SAID SOMETHING BAD ABOUT LEGEND OF ZELDA! (runs away)

Shadow: What the! (Is now locked in a room with a bunch of overly obsessed fan girls) AHHHH! GET ME OUT OF HERE! (tries to break door down)

Good, happy now? And to keep my friend Den from killing me (gives her a Tails plushy and a Shadow plushy). Now celebrate winter-een-mas or the gaming gods shall curse thy thumbs. And I shall curse thy eyeballs if thy does not review.

Neco: Someone help us…

EVERYONE THINKS SONIC CAN'T BE COOL! I SHALL SHOW THEM THE LIGHT! (goes off plotting something)

Sonic: …I'd like to get off the train to crazy-vill now.

Shut up, now get me some sugar so I can figure out how to make you cooler without breaking the 'you don't use weapons' rule thingy. Most of the current ideas include you getting beat up a lot, possibly loss of blood and consciousness.

* * *

Central City, GEM headquarters, 22 hours after Moon has been kidnapped

Neco sighed and leaned against the wall. A day had passed since the black hedgehog had taken Moon and they still had no idea where it was. He was starting to get quicker to anger, even Star had once had to tell him to calm down. He sighed and looked over at the small desk he had for whenever he had to do paperwork. On it was a framed snapshot from a few years ago. A younger looking Neco was smiling in the snapshot next to an equally younger looking Moon, who was winking and making a peace sign with her hand. In the background was an old shooting gallery at a faire, the owner of which was writing Moon's and Neco's names on a white board with dry erase marker. They had only managed to beat the lowest of the high scores that day. Moon had written on the photo the words 'Good times'. Neco sighed. That had been before the rest of his family had been killed. He shook his head to prevent the memories from rising again.

"That's it, I give up!" Someone said in the hallway. Neco fallowed the source of the voice to find a very large and normally intimidating bear. "What's the matter?" Neco asked. "That damn hedgehog! I did everything I know to get him to talk. He's not even intimidated by anything I did! He didn't even blink!" The bear yelled. Neco smiled to himself. Something told him Shadow wasn't going to answer questions very easily. "Let me talk to him." Neco said. "You're not gonna get anything out of him." The bear told him. "We'll see." Neco responded.

Neco entered the bare white room. Shadow sat in a collapsible metal chair, his arms folded and one foot resting on his knee. Neco sat down in another chair opposite him. "So, I heard you don't wanna answer any questions." Neco said. Shadow remained unresponsive. "Why didn't you hand over the emerald when asked?" Neco asked. No answer. "Surely you heard about the emerald thefts, why didn't you tell anyone about finding the emerald?" Neco asked. Again no answer. "Just as I thought…" Neco said. "Well if you won't answer those questions, answer this one. I know that if you wanted to you could have easily been outside this building and out of any sort of locating system's range in less then five minutes. Why are you still here?" Neco said, looking right at him. Shadow's eyes shifted to meet with Neco's. He unfolded his hands and placed both feet on the ground. "Not that it matters to you…" Shadow began. "But I have nearly no memories of my past. When I found that emerald, I had a feeling it was a replica, but decided that it might be worth holding onto. As much as it infuriates me to help that blue hedgehog, something won't stop telling me that if I assist you and those others with the problem of whoever's stealing the chaos emeralds and kidnapped your friend, I just might find what I'm looking for." Shadow finished. "…I see." Neco said. After the weird stuff that he'd seen involving the chaos emeralds, this seemed believable. "As for why I wouldn't answer anyone else, they were all fools that thought they could intimidate me into answers." Shadow smirked. Neco felt himself grin a bit. Despite how much the two hedgehogs were rivals, they were alike in more then slight similarities in appearance.

Neco explained to the chief of GEM the situation. He was reluctant, especially with all the rumors circulating about the ultimate life form. However, realizing that if they did try and truly keep him contained, Shadow would easily escape, and then they'd loose what could be a very valuable ally. Shadow was soon walking out of the GEM building, catching the eyes of the crowd that had already grown at noticing the presence of the blue hero. Shadow looked over towards Sonic and narrowed his eyes. "You won by a fluke, next time you won't be so lucky." He said to Sonic. "Whatever, but you did admit I won." Sonic smirked. "Let's just agree not to knock down another building next time." He said. "No promises there faker." Shadow said, himself smirking this time. "And tell your wolf friend to keep her hands to herself." Shadow said as he walked off in his own direction. Star just stared at him, she turned towards Tails as if to ask him something, but the teenage genius just shook his head. "It's better not to ask how he knows sometimes." Tails explained.

* * *

Neco was on the top of the GEM headquarters roof, looking at the sky and the buildings that stretched up into it. The few wisps of clouds could be seen reflected in the building's windows, almost camouflaging the structures. He just stared deep in thought for a while. "…Moon…I hope you're ok." He said aloud. He closed his eyes and let his mind wander, nearly oblivious to the world around him. Something soon brought him back to attention though. The sound of helicopter blades spinning through the air. He looked right above him to see the helicopter right above him. Something dropped out of it, heading to land right were he was standing. He jumped backwards as something, no someone, landed right were he had stood seconds earlier. Whoever it was stood up, whipping its head around quickly taking in its surroundings as it snarled like an enraged beast. "…Moon!" Neco said, recognizing her. ("Alright, this is stating the obvious, but something's not right with her!") He thought quickly. Her nails had grown to blackened claws, her eyes were glowing a gold color and her fangs gleamed with saliva. She growled and spotted Neco, her unexplained rage aimed right at him. "Moon! It's me, Neco!" Neco yelled at her, trying to bring her to her senses.

Moon growled and lunged at Neco, slashing at him with her claws. Neco attempted to dodge, but the claws connected with his flesh, staining his off white fur and black trench coat with a few droplets of blood that flew from the cuts. He winced and started to reach for one of his guns. "…I can't." He muttered to himself through gritted teeth. "Moon stop it! Whatever the heck's happened to you, this isn't who you are!" He yelled, trying to reach whatever shred of his friend remained in this creature that was attacking him. Moon snarled still, her transformed eyes fixated upon him. "You will die!" She growled out in a voice that did not belong to her. She ran at him. She punched at him, putting all of her weight behind her fist. Neco instinctively dodged and swung his foot to trip her. She fell to the hard cement rooftop of the building. "Moon! Are you alright!" Neco said in concern. He bent down besides her to see if she was ok. He soon realized he should have thought before he acted. Moon came up with a punch to his gut, then another to his ribs, causing the sound of something snapping. She shoved Neco to the ground and was about to pounce on him, intent on driving her claws through his flesh. Neco managed to shove himself out of the way.

Neco was pretty sure that that punch to his ribcage had broken one or two of his ribs. He was having trouble breathing and it pained him to do so. He shakily got back to his feet. "Moon! …Calm…down!" He managed to yell between heavy breaths. Moon jumped at him, slicing across his torso with her claws as she shoved him to the ground, her claws digging into his skin. Then she went to bite at into his shoulder, her fangs dug deep into it. Neco's head was thrown back as he howled in pain. He grabbed her arms and tore them away from him, then kicked her in the stomach to knock her away from him. More blood spilled over his fur and cloths, flowing from the wounds he had just received. His fur was being rapidly covered in a crimson dye, showing the speed that he was losing blood. He was starting to lose control of his own actions as animalistic instincts to defend his life rang through his mind. Moon snarled as she crouched on all fours. Her body was yelling in pain at her, but the creature that controlled her actions now did not care. She ran forward. Neco saw her and instantly drew forth one of his guns. He held it, aimed right at her head. Moon stopped, recognizing the gun as a weapon that would easily end her life. She growled lowly as she waited to see his next action.

Neco slowly managed to regain control over his thoughts. "…I can't do this…" He said, dropping the gun. He dropped to his knees. "I can't fight you." He said. As soon as Moon saw the weapon leave his hand she rushed at him. "…So this is how it ends…Killed by my best friend's hands…" Neco said, looking up to watch the enraged creature that Moon had become run towards him with the look of intent to end his life in her eyes. "I…" He began. Despite the pain that he felt, and the fact that soon his time on this earth would end, he smiled. "I accept this type of death I guess." He said.

Moon was nearly within range to lash out and pierce one of his vitals, when she suddenly stopped and looked confused at him. He eyes were flickering between the strange gold color and their normal bright silver. Slowly the gold started to fade as her nails and fangs returned to normal. "Neco? What happened?" She asked in confusion. "Moon? Is that you?" Neco asked, looking to see his best friend again. She was confused, and in a way, lost. The pain that the thing from before had ignored now fell upon her as she weakly collapsed. Neco got to his feet and quickly dashed to her side to help hold her up. He grunted in pain at the stress it put on his body, especially his broken ribs.

"Moon…It's alright, I'm here to help you." Neco said to her. "Neco, I'm sorry…I didn't have any control over what I was doing." Moon said in a panic as she hugged Neco. "I'm still alive, don't worry." He said to calm her. "…Come on, you need to get to the hospital." He said, starting to help her towards the door leading to the stairs back into the rest of the building. In an undertone, he added "Probably me too once the others see the shape I'm in…"

Moon pulled at his sleeve weakly, trying to gain his attention. He turned to look at her face. "Eneco…He used…chaos energy…" She said, her eyes starting to drift close. She fainted. "…Eneco…" Neco said the name, his eyes widening at the sound of it. He heard the sound of the helicopter from before. Looking up, he saw it again, a lot closer then before though. Hanging onto it with one hand was a black fox with silver irises that wore a black trench coat and black denim pants. He appeared to be regarding the whole scene indifferently. "…You! …" Neco said, his feature hardening in hate of the person he saw. The black fox's eyes shifted in acknowledgement of Neco. Then the helicopter flew away.

* * *

Later at the Central city hospital

Moon rested on one of the beds as Tails examined her for something. Neco was standing there with dried blood on his fur, his cuts having stopped bleeding but yet to have scabbed over. His breath showed the pain of his broken ribs. Star stood by Moon's side, her hand holding onto her unconscious sister's. Tails sighed. "Someone's pumped her full of negative chaos energy." He said. "Negative chaos energy?" Neco questioned. "The chaos emerald's energy reacts to emotion. If triggered by things such as hate, anger, and the wish to destroy, the energy becomes negative and basically…evil." Sonic explained. "What I want to know is who would do this to her and send her to attack her best friend…" Star said, anger and sadness in her voice. She looked up at Neco. "Neco, you should get treated. You're badly hurt." She said to him. "I've had worse…" Neco said. "But," The three of them started. "I'm fine." Neco stated.

"Right now the bigger concern is how are we going to help her? If she's still got that energy inside her, she might lose control of herself and become whatever the hell that was again." Neco said. Tails looked down in thought. "…I've got it!" He yelled out suddenly. "We'll take her to the master emerald! It can neutralize the powers of the seven chaos emeralds, so it can help her easily!" He said. "Smart thinking buddy." Sonic praised Tails. "But where is this master emerald?" Star asked. "That's the only problem. It's on Angel Island. …It kind of is floating in the sky." Tails said scratching the back of his head. "Plus, the guardian of it might not let us use it." He added. "Oh relax Tails, we've got the Tornado 2 and Knucklehead's smart enough to know that this is an emergency. He knows us well enough to let us near the master emerald." Sonic said crossing his arms.

"Neco?" Moon's voice came softly. She had woken up halfway, her eyes still closed. Star looked to her. "He's right here sis, don't worry." She said. Neco went over to Moon's side. He took her hand and softly said to her "Relax, just rest. You need to sleep a little while longer." Moon gently squeezed his hand before falling into a deep sleep again. Star sighed and looked at Sonic and Tails. "We'll have to try." She said. She growled lowly. "Whoever did this to her is going to pay…" Neco gripped Moon's hand tighter.

"Well what are we standing around here for! Let's go!" Sonic said as he shifted his weight on his feet, showing his impatience. "We'll take the Tornado 2, it's the fastest way to get to Angel Island." Tails said. The two of them headed towards the door. Neco made to fallow when Sonic turned around and pushed him back towards a seat. "Oh no you don't, you need medical attention!" Sonic stated to Neco. "I'm fine!" Neco yelled back. "Besides, what are you going to do if she wakes up before you can get her there!" Neco pointed out. "He has a point…he's probably the only one that could stop her if she did." Star said with a sigh. "At the very least, let me bandage your wounds and wrap your ribs first." She insisted, crossing her arms. "…Alright." Neco answered. Star nodded and started to wrap medical tape around his wounds. She then looked over to the others. "How are we going to move Moon? Neco can't carry her in this condition. He'd just hurt himself." She said. Neco looked off to the side as if defying her statement. "And how are we going to get us all there? There's barely enough room for all of us in the Tornado 2 as is." She stated. "No problem." Tails said. "I can carry Moon, it should be easy enough if I fly. And Neco can hold onto her in the plane while you go to Angel Island with Sonic." Tails said. "But how can he get there? He can't fly as far as I can tell." Star said confused. Sonic smirked. "Trust me, it'll be easy." Sonic said. "We'll go ahead and tell you exactly where the island is so that you don't wind up in the middle of the ocean." Tails said. "Here, take this." Tails said, tossing Sonic what looked something similar to a cell phone. "It's a transmission device." Tails quickly explained.

* * *

Two and a half hours later, somewhere above the ocean.

Neco held onto Moon's sleeping form. He had been afraid that the roar of the plane's engine might wake her, but she remained asleep the entire flight. He almost felt himself fall asleep more then once, but managed to keep himself awake. Tails soon announced over the engine noise "There it is. Angel Island." Sure enough, there was a giant floating mass of earth ahead of them. It had lush forests with tall red mountains that overshadowed almost everything else on the island. Tails turned the plane gently, heading towards one side of the island. There, a long strip of the earth stuck out, palm trees growing in two rows at regular intervals leading to a red building bearing Tails' two fox tails logo. The building had many pumps and rotating devices on one side of it. Tails hit a button among the plane's several controls. The palm trees bent over as the earth parted and a runway lifted up leading to the hanger doors which were slowly opening. Neco couldn't help but be impressed at the artificial trees he had placed along the runway, despite the lack of reason seen for it. Tails landed the plane and slowly pulled it into the building. Inside were pieces of another bi plane. These were red and accented in blue. Tails stopped the engine and climbed out. "This is a workshop of mine." He explained to Neco. "That," He said, gesturing towards the pieces. "Is what's left of the original Tornado."

Tails pulled out a similar device to the one he had given Sonic. He pressed a few buttons on it and held it to his ear. "Hello? Is it working?" He asked. "Good." He said smiling. He started to state various distances. Soon there was a flash of light and Sonic and Star were standing right besides him, Star looking rather sick to her stomach. "You should have seen how freaked out you looked when I told you we were going to get here using chaos control." Sonic chuckled. Neco started to try and get out of the plane, still holding onto Moon. "Neco, here, I'll carry her, you'll just hurt yourself." Star said. "I've told you I'm fine." Neco said. "You're going to get yourself killed if you keep acting like this." Star argued. Neco sighed and closed his eyes. When he opened them they had turned bright green again. He got out of the plane, holding Moon bridal style without much difficulty. Star sighed at his stubbornness. "I'm just concerned for you ok? You're my sister's best friend." She said. "And from some of the things I heard from her, you're more then just her friend." She whispered, but Neco's ears picked it up anyways. He blushed lightly.

Sonic lead the group outside onto the plateau the workshop was located on. "If I remember correctly, it's…" He said aloud looking around. "That way." He said, pointing towards a cave. He ran at half speed to allow the others to at least see where he was headed. The others quickly fallowed him. The cave lead to a circular passageway made of blue stone. At the end of it was a stone doorway leading back outside. There was a short stretch of ground before there was a sudden drop, where the floating island ended. However there was also a wooden bridge leading to a smaller mass of land, floating along with the rest of the island. In the distance one could make out some sort of stone alter with a green glow coming from it. "Come on, it's just across the bridge." Sonic said. He started to run across the bridge ahead of the others. Star stayed a little in front of Neco as they fallowed him.  
Moon started to stir. "Neco?" She asked, unsure as to who was carrying her as she struggled to wake up. Neco looked down at her. His eyes were still green, and to her they appeared as deep pools concealing some secret she couldn't help but wonder at what it could be. "Don't worry, we're almost there." He said to her, gently rubbing between her shoulder blades with one hand to keep her calm. Moon nodded a little and rested against him more, causing Neco to blush a little. "Ok Neco." She said, her eyes falling half closed. Star looked back and smiled a little. Her worry about Neco's injuries hadn't disappeared though.

They were about to cross the bridge when something overshadowed them. They looked up to see a figure in the air above them with its fist raised. It came crashing down at them. Neco quickly jumped backwards to avoid the punch, but his wounds caused him to stumble and loose his balance and grip on Moon. Luckily they were all out of the way of the small explosion that erupted from the figure's white gloved fist as it collided with the ground. The red attacker stood up, revealing himself as an echidna with a white crescent mark on its chest near his neck. He glared at them with his purple eyes. "Who are you and what are you doing here!" He demanded, his more fang like teeth showing as he yelled. He clenched one of his massive hands in a fist again, making the spikes on his knuckles more evident. "I said tell me what you're doing here!" He yelled again. "Relax Knuckles, these guys are with us." Sonic said, running back across the bridge towards them. "Oh…" the echidna said, relaxing his fist and letting it drop to his side. "But I still need to know what you're doing here." He said, looking back to them, asking more politely this time.

Moon's eyes sprang open. They were once again that golden shade of insanity. She got to her feet and spotted Knuckles. She growled lowly as her fangs and nails began to grow. Knuckles readied his fists once more, seeing the signs of aggression coming from Moon and not knowing what was going on. Neco judged the echidna's strength. Even this animal like Moon wouldn't be able to withstand a blow from him. Neco knew what he was about to do was risky, in fact it was entirely foolish. He got to his feet and approached Moon slowly. He whispered to her softly "Moon, please calm down. We need him to help you." Moon's growls slowed and she shook her head. She closed her eyes as she did, and when she opened them they had returned to their normal silver coloring. "I'm sorry." She said weakly as she looked at the ground trembling. "What happened to her?" Knuckles asked, dropping his fists but keeping his guard up. "Someone put negative chaos energy into her. We'll explain more later, right now we need to use the master emerald." Tails said.

Knuckles looked at Moon for a while, appearing to be in deep thought at making a decision. "…Alright, you may approach the emerald." He said, turning around and headed across the bridge. Neco helped Moon across as they fallowed him. The ancient stone alter had a short amount of stairs leading up to a pedestal holding an absolutely enormous emerald that was admitting the green glow that they had seen earlier. Knuckles approached the giant gem and rested one hand on it. He closed his eyes as if trying to focus on a memory. "The severs are the seven chaos, chaos is power, power is enriched by the heart, the controller is the one that unifies the chaos." He recited. "Master emerald, I ask of you to expel the negative energy forced upon this innocent life." He requested, removing his hand. The emerald began to rotate. Slowly at first, but quickly gaining speed and emitting a bright light. The light grew so bright that they all had to shield their eyes.

* * *

CLIFFY!

Neco: …

Contemplating my murder?

Neco: Thinking about it…

Knuckles: Finally! Took you long enough!

…how did you get out of the room?

Knuckles: Dug my way out.

Oh, okay. (sits on a throne of never melting ever replenishing delicious chocolate and nibbles some of it, holding a sword made of a game console controller)

Sonic: …what the heck?

Tails: I think we should just ignore the impossibilities of the things he does. (goes and plays Super Smash Brothers Melee)

Wanna play versus mode?

Tails: Sure (gives me a controller)

(we play melee while ignoring Shadow's cries to let him out of the room filled with overly obsessed fan girls that are currently trying to steal his shoes)

Remember to review and celebrate Winter-een-mas!


	6. Master Emerald Shattered

Hello again (is wearing a cap on backwards for no apparent reason). I'm sorry that I haven't updated recently, but if you don't review, I don't post. After all, how do you think I feel when I go to read reviews and only see 9 reviews? … (eats more of my chocolate throne)

Tails: (is at a computer playing Everquest)

Sonic: (is eating pizza)

Neco: (is shoved in the box for a pervious comment)

Shadow: (Is just standing around…what? He rarely ever does anything other then fight and stand around)

Hmm…I need to torture someone for this one… (suddenly Shadow is hit with a random bolt of lightning)

Shadow: (yells in pain and then hits the floor, resembling hedgehog bacon) (cough) Why did you do that to me!

Because you're fun to mess with, and the bolt of lightning was because it's how I torture the characters of what I hope will be my future web comic.

Gunner: It's true

Cha-Chain: (nods head)

Back in the box you two… (shoves my badly drawn oddly named characters into the cardboard box)

Read and review or else…

* * *

The emerald's light finally started to fade as the colossal gem slowed down. As the group began to rub their eyes to focus them to the normal levels of light, they saw Moon was apparently in a light sleep on the ground, her nails a normal length. "Is she alright?" Star asked, slowly heading towards her. Neco looked at Moon for a long time. "…She seems alright, but…" He said. "There's something different still." He finished. "How can you tell?" Tails asked looking at Neco. "Not sure, just can." Neco shrugged. Everyone's attention went back to Moon. She slowly was beginning to awaken again. Her eyes still half closed she slowly got to her feet. Her eyes slowly fully opened. They were their normal silver like color. 

She was still obviously tired, but she looked down at her own hands, as if trying to make sure she wasn't dreaming. "Oh thank gods…" She sighed in relief. She turned and saw Neco, smiling at her, glad to have his best friend back to her normal self. Moon suddenly was tightly hugging him. "I'm so sorry!" She cried. "How bad did I hurt you?" She asked. "You broke some of his ribs." Sonic answered for Neco, considering he was having trouble doing so without wincing from Moon's hug. She immediately let go of him.

Moon took the time to look at the bandages that her sister had applied to Neco's wounds. "I'm so sorry…" She said. "I didn't want to…I tried to stop…but I couldn't." She said, tears forming at the corners of her eyes. Neco shook his head and gently rested his hand on her shoulder. "It's alright. I'm fine. I'm still alive and breathing am I not?" He said to her, smiling a little.

"Anyone care to explain the current situation to me?" Knuckles asked he sat down near the master emerald out of habit to make sure he was near it. "It's a long story, but we've got the time." Tails said as he remained standing to retell the events to the red guardian. Knuckles for once remained quiet throughout the entire story, despite a few things confusing him, and held his questions until Tails was done.

Knuckles seemed to think for a while after hearing the entire story. However he soon got up to his feet and jumped of the stone alter. He glided a short distance and then dropped down towards a bush with his fist drawn back, only to have it stop millimeters away from something hidden in it. "You again?" he sighed angrily. A white female bat stood up from the bush, her turquoise eyes showing amusement. "You're slipping Knucklehead, I've been here for nearly half an hour and you just now noticed me?" She said teasing the guardian. "You never give up do you batgirl?" Knuckles said annoyed. "I have a name and I expect you to use it." She said, becoming equally annoyed. "Whatever Rouge." Knuckles said crossing his arms. "Believe it or not, I'm only here to make sure you're doing your job for once. I don't want anyone else getting their hands on my emerald." She said pointing at him, putting emphasis on the word 'my'. "If I hadn't been preoccupied, you would have been off this island long ago. And it's not your emerald." Knuckles said scowling. "Oh really?" Rouge said, giving an almost seductive smile that showed off her pearly white fanged teeth. Knuckles mentally shook his head. "Yeah, really." He said attempting to scowl more so.

"Could the two of you stop flirting and pay attention for once?" Came Sonic's voice, making them aware of their surroundings again. The two of them both turned to argue with the blue hedgehog's 'flirting' comment and instead saw something had fallen atop the master emerald. It stood atop the grand jewel, making what it was more obvious. It was an echidna very much like Knuckles, but had an entirely black body. "What the hell?" Knuckles said, confused by the intruder. He growled and ran back towards the alter and leapt at the black echidna. It jumped off the emerald, avoiding Knuckles' fists. "Another one of them…" Moon growled as she looked at it.

"Objective confirmed. Will retrieve master emerald." The black echidna said in a monotone voice that matched the other black foes they had encountered. It jumped back towards Knuckles, only to have the red guardian tackle it down in midair. The black echidna kicked Knuckles backwards off him. "Warning, estimated damage to systems from direct hit estimated at 20 percent. Suggested course of action, temporary retreat to better prepare for next attempt." It said as if speaking to someone. It remained motionless for a few seconds. "Understood, new objective confirmed." It said as it suddenly jumped back atop the master emerald. "What the hell is it doing!" Both Knuckles and Rouge yelled. It suddenly brought its fist down upon the master emerald, causing it to shatter and burst apart. "NO!" Knuckles yelled as he charged at the black echidna and kicked it powerfully, sending it flying over the edge of the floating island, with no end until the ocean below.

Knuckles growled as he turned towards the others. "Get to safer ground, or off the island if you can manage it, now!" He yelled. "What's going on!" Star asked in confusion. "The whole island's gonna fall towards the ocean is what!" Sonic yelled having seen what happened when the giant emerald shattered or was stolen. "Let's head for the base of the mountains, since the island has more mass there we should feel less of the force of when the island hits the ocean." Tails said. "Right." Sonic nodded as he grabbed Star and Moon's hands before dashing off. Tails grabbed Neco by his arms and took off using his two tails to fly. Knuckles and Rouge had already taken off on their own.

* * *

After the island landed in the ocean, a little ways away from the shores of Station Square 

The wave resulting from the island hitting the ocean water had thankfully died down to a safe level before it hit land somehow. The force of the landing had still thrown Sonic a few feet into the air. They now sat at the base of the red mountains, where the grass began getting thinner, with still no sight of the red guardian or the thief with a passion for valuable jewels. "I have a feeling that thing fallowed me…" Moon said depressed. "I'm so sorry…" She nearly whispered. "Don't blame yourself Moon, you didn't choose for this to happen, it was forced upon you." Star said to her. "But it's because of me that all this trouble's happened…" Moon's voice was heavy with sadness. Neco sighed. "That thing said objective confirmed when it looked at the master emerald, it was obviously here for it." He said. "But…" Moon said looking up. "Shut up and listen to him, he seems to know what he's saying." Came a rather annoyed voice. Rouge the bat had landed among them silently and unnoticed until she spoke.

Neco looked over at Rouge. "…Now I remember. You would be Rouge the bat, the spy for the government that was assigned to find information about Project Shadow during the events aboard the ARK two years ago. Also known to have a passion for valuable treasures that don't belong to her…" He said. "You've done your homework." Rouge smirked. "I also know about you trench boy." She said, causing Neco to raise a brow at the new nickname. "You're Neco Indignus, a member of the organization known as G.E.M., which was originally proposed nearly fifty years ago as a way to prevent world disasters, however only gained official support two days after the ARK incident. You're known for often being found in the middle of a chaotic situation." She said, surprising Neco at her knowledge. "You learn a few things by doing the country some favors now and then." Rouge smirked.

"Does that include being a little thief?" Came an angered voice as Knuckles walked into the group, his violet eyes glaring at Rouge for no apparent reason. However, the reason became apparent as he stomped over to her and held his hand out open palm up. Rouge just stared at his hand for a while. "Give them up…" Knuckles growled. Rouge sighed and dropped two small green shards into the echidna's grip. Satisfied now that they were in his possession, he sat down and crossed his arms. "Well…at least I'm finally dealing with a smart thief." Knuckles said, sending another glare at Rouge. Rouge turned her head to look the other way in anger of the echidna's insult to her thieving abilities.

"They couldn't take it as a whole, so they're gonna try and take it in pieces." Knuckles stated. "It has to be the same people that are going after the chaos emeralds…Whatever they're planning it can't be good." Neco said. "They must know about the Master Emerald's power over the chaos emeralds and don't want it anything to interfere with their objectives." Tails stated. "It could be far worse then that…" Knuckles said closing his eyes. "The master emerald has an untold number of powers…We don't know what they could do if they get their hands on the chaos emeralds and the master emerald." He said sighing. "So what? You just have to get your hands on them first." Rouge said finally turning her head back towards the group. "Luckily for you, you have the worlds greatest treasure hunter right here." She said confidently. "Yeah, Knuckles is pretty good at finding things isn't he?" Sonic said. "Yea-Hey wait!" Rouge said glaring at the blue hedgehog. Sonic had trouble stopping himself from laughing while Knuckles simply smirked. Sonic calmed his laughter and stood up. "Alright, time for another adventure." He said with his signature grin. "Are you always so happy to be risking your life?" Neco said sarcastically. "Who said you couldn't be a hero and not have fun doing it?" Sonic answered.

Moon looked down at the ground. "…The one sending them…his name is Eneco." She said quietly. Neco however heard it. He limited his reaction to that name to clenching his fists tightly, nearly breaking the skin. Star looked at Neco. "Before we do anything, Neco needs to have his wounds tended to." She said. "How many times do I have to tell you! I'm fine!" Neco argued. "Would you shut up and listen to reason! You've got broken ribs!" Tails yelled at him. "I've had worse, I'm telling you I'm fine." Neco said, jabbing his thumb at himself. "Huh?" He said in confusion. He pressed his hand against his chest. "…Hey, I really am fine." He said. Moon looked at Neco. She walked over next to him and felt his chest. "Hey, he is ok." She said. "His ribs aren't broken at all…" She stated. Star got up and checked him as well. "How the hell did your bones mend themselves so quickly? You look like you were barely attacked at all." She wondered aloud. "How…how the?" Neco said aloud as he patted himself down, unable to believe it. Every place that he had been cut, bruised, or wounded somehow, was now perfectly alright, not even a scab could be found.

"…This is disturbing." Neco said aloud. "It defies all logic…" Star said as she scratched her head in confusion. "It's because of the chaos energy that's inside him." Someone said. Out of nowhere, Shadow walked right into the group. "Rouge." He said nodding his head towards her in the simplest form of recognition towards her. "How the hell did you get here? And what are you talking about?" Neco asked him. "Ran across the water, pretty easy to find you after hearing all the idiots scared out of their minds about a wave." Shadow answered. "And as I was saying…" He said looking at each of those in the group in turn with his red eyes. He stopped when he was looking directly at Sonic. "You've probably noticed that if you're gotten yourself wounded in battles that in very short periods of time you're left without even a scar…" He said as if not really caring. "Kinda, never thought much about it though." Sonic said. Neco could have sworn Shadow wanted to say 'As if you ever think about anything' just then.

"If a living being can harness chaos energy, then their body naturally increases the speed it does its 'repairs' you could say." Shadow said simply. "Strange though for one so inexperienced in the power of the chaos emeralds to have an injury such as a broken bone healed so quickly." He said. "Whatever, at least it's useful that you can heal fast." Star said. "It does have its limits though. I wouldn't advise relying on it." Shadow added.

"I have to find the master emerald shards." Knuckles said standing up. "A few of them are still on this island…Near the mountain top." He said looking up. He started heading towards the peak. "I'm coming too." Rouge said fallowing him. "Oh no you don't! The master emerald isn't yours, and its restoration isn't your concern!" Knuckles yelled at her. "Shut up, you've got my help regardless of if you like it or not." Rouge said as she passed him on the way up the mountain. "Hold it bat girl!" Knuckles yelled as he ran after her.

"Shouldn't we help them too? I mean, I should at least thank him for letting us near the emerald to help me." Moon said. "Nah, Knuckles doesn't like a whole lot of help anyways, gets in the way of his methods." Sonic said. "…We've got a visitor." Neco said as he suddenly pulled out one of his guns and fired into the nearby vegetation. There was the sound of metal contacting metal at high speeds, fallowed by a dull thud. The group went to investigate it, and found a small red robot that resembled a tiny egg with wings collapsed on the ground with Neco's bullet in it. On one side of it in yellow and blue there was the icon of two beady eyes and glasses, a big nose and a ridiculously cartoon like grin beneath the large mustache that grew from the nose. "Eggman's logo…" Sonic said looking at it. "It's one of his spy robots…I don't think this one gathered a lot of information from us though…the camera isn't very powerful." Tails said picking it up and examining it.

Tails pulled a small screwdriver out of his belt and used it to pry the robot open to look at it further. "The shot hit the transmitter too." He said pointing at the small mechanical box the bullet was lodged in currently. "Wonder what the good doctor's up too…" Sonic said, putting sarcasm on the word good. "Perhaps we should pay him a visit." Shadow said. "That's fine by me, he's been to quiet recently anyways. I bet he's up to something." Sonic said. Tails was still confused about how cheaply made the spy robot was made. "The transmitter isn't all that powerful too…Eggman must have his current base set up nearby." The teen genius said aloud. "Eggman just keeps getting stupider and stupider. He knows this is Knuckles' territory and still puts a base up nearby? I guess his brain's finally scrambled." Sonic said. "Can you cut the bad puns and get moving for once faker?" Shadow said impatiently. "Yeah, yeah." Sonic responded.

"Tails, you and the others hand out at the workshop, see if you can figure out anything more from that spybot. Shadow and I can more then easily enough deal with the doctor." Sonic said turning towards Tails. "Sure. Hey Shadow, catch." Tails said, tossing another one of the small cell phone shaped items at Shadow, who caught it with a single hand. "Use it if you need to keep in touch somehow." Tails answered the ebony hedgehog's confused look. "I doubt I'll seriously need it." Shadow said as he looked back down at it. "Figured you'd say something like that…" Tails sighed.

The two hedgehogs suddenly sped off and out of sight. "…We're seriously going to need to run laps more often if we even have a hope of keeping within eyesight of those two." Neco said as he looked at where the two once stood. Tails laughed at Neco's statement. "Come on, let's go to my workshop. It's not much, but it's better then just standing around doing nothing." He said as he started walking in a different direction from that which Sonic and Shadow had taken.

* * *

End chapter! (is now hyper off sugar) Sorry this one's a lot shorter, but I need to work on the next one, which is gonna be hopefully longer and have a whole bunch of good battle scenes in them. And then…YOU WILL SEE THE LIGHT! 

Sonic: …Why do I not like where this is going?

Shut up, I must prove your coolness and your health is not a prime concern. (eats more of my chocolate throne while glaring at Knuckles, as if daring him to make a comment about me having to get braces tomorrow)

Tails: Wanna play Soul Caliber III?

Sure! (grabs a controller and proceeds to try and defeat Tails who is master at fighting games for some reason)

Click the review button…NOW DAMN IT!


	7. Dr Eggman's Base

Welcome my faithful reviewers! …And the rest of you undeserving fools… To the scenes I've been making you wait 6 chapters for. What awakes the two hedgehogs in Eggman's base within the forest? Here's a hint.

Shadow will find an ally with something important to tell him, something that will disturb his grips on what he knows.

Sonic will encounter his constant nemesis, but the real challenge will come from elsewhere. Also, a possible clue to what these pure black and purely crimson eyed adversaries really are.

And what will Knuckles and Rouge find atop the mountain in their search for the shards of the master emerald? Only by reading will you learn! (And if you don't review then I won't keep updating.)

* * *

There it was, made almost entirely out of metal and bearing his logo all over it, was Eggman's base, right down to the stupid looking eggbots patrolling it. Sonic and Shadow stood looking at this huge waist of time and space as it jetted out from the rest of the forest. "Looks like there's two different ways in." Sonic said looking as the series of platforms lead to different areas, and yet no real definite entrance was obvious. "Looks like it…" Shadow said. "I'll take the right path, you can take the left." Sonic said as he ran towards the eggbots head on. "Heh, never stop and consider your actions do you?" Shadow said aloud. "…Then again, with this weak of defenses, who would need to?" Shadow said looking around. "…Either something's up or…Nah, I'm just thinking about this too much." Shadow decided as he ran towards the annoyingly shaped robots.

* * *

Meanwhile with Knuckles and Rouge.

Knuckles growled in irritation at his luck. He was stuck looking for the shards of the master emerald with Rouge, and she was ahead of him still. He ruthlessly dug his knuckle claws into the side of the mountain as he climbed, intent on passing ahead of Rouge. That bat just plain made him angry. ("Yet…She's kinda attractive when she's angry and sarcastic like that…") The thought managed to sneak into Knuckles mind without his notice until afterwards. He growled at himself and tore a fraction of the stone away from the rest of the massive red mountain as he climbed it. He was now angry at the strange black ones, and himself for thinking anything positive about Rouge. His anger was forgotten however as he felt something familiar.

He quickly began digging into the rock, it was if the mountain had suddenly swallowed him up. Then instantly as if it had spit him back out again, he emerged. "All right." He said smiling to himself as he held a sizable piece of the master emerald in one gloved hand. Rouge may be farther up the mountain then he was, but he was ahead on the total number of pieces. However the bat was still moving, and he wasn't about to let her get ahead of him if he could help it. He quickly began to ascend the tall mountain with new confidence added to his ego.

* * *

Back to Sonic

Sonic smirked as he looked at the line of busted robot parts left in his wake. That was simply to easy, no barriers to get around or anything, he'd taken a whole bunch of them out with just a few simple homing attacks. He was honestly a little disappointed, he had been looking forwards to a classic Doctor Ivo Robotnik style of defense that was fun to tackle and leave busted and humiliated, and instead he had only encountered a handful of his lightly armed robots that didn't even know how to shoot straight. He was actually considering saying that he was insulted to Eggman's face just to get the round man angry, when he spied a series a few multicolored flying robots armed with gattling guns that were evenly spaced apart, and fell just short of jumping distance of a pipe just the right size for the blue hedgehog to grind on. "Alright, finally some fun." Sonic said as he flexed his neck a few times before he ran at the robots. They spotted him and began to unload their supplies of ammo at him. He easily dodged the horribly aimed shoots by jumping over them and using a homing attack right at the first of them. He immediately used it again to shoot himself up to the next one, and again pulling him up to the third. As the three destroyed robot's parts fell down below, Sonic light dashed to reach the pipe and landed atop it perfectly. When he reached the end he jumped off, did a somersault in mid air, and then landed perfectly on both feet with practiced ease. "Now that's more like it." He said smirking.

He finally found a way in, a huge armored door that didn't look like it was going to open anytime soon. "Hmm…" Sonic thought as he examined the door. "…This could take a while." He said aloud as he looked around for some way to make the massive entryway open up. "Eggman always has some way in…" Sonic said thinking. He looked around and spotted a small rocket launcher platform. "Well, not exactly the most creative way of getting it open, but works for me." He said smirking. He ran over to the rocket launcher. "Now let's see…" He said pointing it towards the door. Not really sure of how to activate the thing, he just kicked it. Kicking it could have blown his leg to bits for all he knew, but instead it worked, shooting the missile right at the metal gateway. The rocket only managed to blow a small hole in it, but that was no problem for Sonic as he squeezed his way in.

* * *

With Shadow  
"Tch, this is hardly worth my time…" Shadow said as he crushed another eggbot with his fist. He was beginning to get irritated. Nothing of use to him, only poorly made robots trying to get in his way. He growled in frustration, this whole venture was pointless. However soon a sound came to his ears. Gunshots and a robotic voice yelling "ERADICATE ALL EGGMAN ROBOTS!" coming from not very far from his current location. He sped off quickly in pursuit of the owner of that voice.

He stopped as his eyes fell upon a black, red, and yellow robot with a flat round head and two red eyes. Its arms were larger then the rest of its body and currently did not have hands but two rapid firing guns connected to an ammunition supply somewhere inside it. On one shoulder there was a symbol shaped like an upside down U, the symbol that its codename came from. Omega, also known as E-123. Shadow smirked as he watched the old ally in its goal to destroy all of its fellow robots created by Dr. Eggman as its revenge for being left locked in that storage room. Shadow ducked as Omega suddenly started to fire in his direction. "What the hell!" He yelled. Suddenly the firing stopped. Shadow looked to see Omega approaching him. "ARE YOU…THE ORIGINAL?" Omega asked, having no way of displaying emotion. "What do you mean?" Shadow asked in confusion. Omega remained silent for some time. Then he turned around and began to walk away. "Wait, Omega what's going on?" Shadow asked. Omega didn't stop, however he did say something. "THERE IS SOMETHING THAT YOU ARE REQUIRED TO SEE, HOWEVER YOU MAY NOT HAVE A POSITIVE REACTION TO IT." Omega said. "FALLOW ME." He continued, not stopping to see if Shadow was fallowing him. Shadow was confused at this, from what he knew of the robot, he didn't usually act like this. However his curiosity made him fallow Omega.

Omega led him atop one of the apparent storage units. The opening was on its roof, and sealed tight with nearly five inches of metal. However, two swings from Omega's massive robotic limbs and this barrier was torn aside. Shadow looked to Omega as if asking a question. Omega's round head turned so his eyes were pointing at the opening. Shadow understood and looked down. What was inside shocked and horrified him to the point of near instant insanity. Inside this storage unit was a dozen or so identical versions of himself, standing in perfect rows without moving. "THIS IS A UNIT OF DOCTOR EGGMAN'S SHADOW ANDROID VERSION 1.3 ARMY. DOCTOR EGGMAN INTENDS TO USE THEM IN HIS NEXT WORLD DOMINATION ATTEMPT." Omega said. "I HAVE ENCOUNTERED THE VERSIONS 1.2 AND 1.1 SEVERAL TIMES SINCE OUR LAST MEETING." The robot continued. Shadow remained silent as he looked down at the androids. "…WARNING, IMMEDIATE AREA DESTRUCTION COMMENCING." Omega said as his clawed metal hands slid back and his flamethrowers clicked into place. "…EGGMAN WILL HAVE THE ANSWER TO YOUR NON ASKED QUESTION." Omega said before he began to torch the unit of androids. Shadow closed his eyes momentarily. "…Good luck on your goal." He said to Omega before he turned and began to run in search of an entrance again. "…I HAVE HOPES THAT THERE IS AN ERROR IN THE ANSWER MY LOGIC SIMULATOR HAS GIVEN ME." Omega said as his red eyes stared at the distancing hedgehog.

* * *

With Rouge and Knuckles

Rouge was irritated, though she had found one of the master emerald shards on the mountain, there was only one left, meaning that if Knuckles got it he'd never stop gloating at winning their unofficial contest of gathering the shards on this mountain. She was not about to let that happen at any time, after all, that emerald was hers. Or at least that's what she told herself. In reality, she had indeed given up on the master emerald back after Knuckles had saved her life that time on the ARK. She still valued its beauty and wished for it to be hers, but she knew despite everything she told herself and no matter how good of a thief she was, that she'd never be able to take it and keep it away from the red echidna. Knuckles' purpose in life was to guard the thing technically, and no matter how dull of a life that would be, Knuckles did his duty with all of his might. Rouge had to admire that sort of dedication.

She scowled as she returned her focus to finding the master emerald shards. She still was higher up then Knuckles, but that didn't matter if she had passed one of the gems out of carelessness. She scanned every bit of the earth she held onto, but no sign of the emerald shard was to be found. She got angry and began using his feet to kick the dirt free, digging to see if there was a shard there. However eventually the dirt gave way and she fell through into something. She got to her feet and dusted herself off as she observed her soundings. She was in some sort of chamber, the way she had fallen in a little ways higher up then the ground she stood on. Something caught her eye. There, covered in a bit of dirt and lying on the ground as if had shot clean through the layer of dirt she had just dug through was a shard of the master emerald. She smiled as she slowly walked towards it, her hand extended to pick it up. But then, a section of the stone ground she stood upon sunk in and the room began to shake. The emerald shard rolled out of sight and could be heard echoing as it collided against walls, as if falling down somewhere. Torches on the walls suddenly burst to life, illuminating a stone tablet on the wall. Rouge didn't have time to fully examine it though, as a big gloved hand suddenly grabbed her own and pulled her out of the room as it was engulfed in fire. Knuckles hung onto the mountainside with one hand as he made sure he had pulled Rouge safely out of the flames' reach. "…Looks like we're done for a while…" He said looking down at the bat. "Yeah…that was too close for comfort…" Rouge said looking back at the room. Even the master emerald shard was useless to them if they got burnt to a crisp trying to get it.

* * *

Inside Dr. Eggman's base.

Sonic ran down countless hallways, crushed countless security devices, and he still wasn't anywhere near wherever the hell Eggman was in this stupid base. He was angry just for Eggman wasting his time like this. "Eggman! Come on and show yourself you cholesterol infested excuse for a villain!" Sonic yelled. Nothing happened and he sighed in frustration before taking off running down the halls again. This was getting frustrating, it was like running in one big circle. Sonic finally stopped when something caught his eye. A smaller corridor, one to small for the giant egg shaped doctor to walk along it seemed. His curiosity led him down the hallway to a simple door with a normal knob. He cautiously turned the knob and opened it. Looking in he couldn't see a lot, as all the lights in the room were out. Suddenly something shoved him into the room and he was swept to one side, the chaos emerald he had been holding onto fell out of his possession. A familiar irritating evil laughter filled his ears as he tried to pick up the emerald only to have it snatched away by a robotic arm. "Well well, this is a surprise." Dr. Eggman's voice came from the darkness. The lights suddenly flickered on, revealing the doctor to be within a sort of balcony shaped room overlooking the area Sonic found himself in. He was standing behind two inches of glass. "Bulletproof." Eggman said, knocking against it. "You won't be able to cause me trouble while I'm in here." He continued.

"Alright Eggman, what are you up to this time…" Sonic said getting to his feet and dusting himself off. "Hmph, you irritating hedgehog, I haven't even started my next ingenious plan and you're already here trying to foil it…" Eggman said crossing his arms. "Don't lie! You've already sent some of your lackeys to try and steal the chaos emeralds and smashed the master emerald!" Sonic said pointing at Eggman accusingly. "I've done no such thing! Why would I want to smash the master emerald when all my equipment is here on the island! I'm not stupid, the island's fall has effected valuable sensitive equipment, I would have tried to avoid something like this from happening!" Eggman ranted. "Yeah right, so just give back the emerald and I won't have to beat you so hard that I could make an omelet out of you." Sonic said crossing his arms and tapping his foot impatiently.

"You don't seem to realize that you're currently in no position to make demands." Eggman said smiling evilly. He hit a button on the control panel that was within his safe haven from the blue hedgehog's wrath. Iron doors on one side of the giant arena like area Sonic was in opened up to show an incomplete built robot, resembling the Egg Emperor that had been smashed a little under a year ago, except Metal Sonic had been the one in control of it back then, and this one seemed to be controlled via remote by Eggman himself. "This again, sheesh, you didn't even finish rebuilding it." Sonic said. "Oh ho, but you had your friends with you when you destroyed it last time, and this time you're all alone." Dr. Eggman chuckled from behind his glass barrier. "Fine then, let's get this over with so I can move on to kicking your butt." Sonic said as he readied himself. "Just try it hedgehog!" Eggman yelled as he entered commands to have his creation attack.

* * *

With Tails and the others.

Tails had been messing with the spy robot for a long time by now, but he still didn't find anything of use from it, it was basically now a pile of scrap sitting on his workbench. He sighed in frustration and shoved all the pieces off to the side. He decided to spend his time on a more productive project, the subject of transportation considering they only have a plane that sits two people tops excluding the pilot. Thankfully, Neco, Moon, and Star, weren't around, so he had more then enough room to work. "Alright, let's see…" He said to himself as he searched his blueprints. Finding the one he needed he walked over towards the remains of the original Tornado. "No sense in wasting parts, besides, with the Tornado 2 we haven't had any need for the original." He said his thoughts aloud as he began to see what he could salvage.

Neco was sitting on one of the steps of Tails' workshop. He sighed as he looked down from near sunset lit sky and down at his own hand. He clenched it into a fist as he muttered "Eneco…You just keep adding to your list of sins…" under his breath. He stared at his own fist for some time. Something was happening to him, he could feel it. There was something changing, but what would happen when it did, he didn't know. All he could do was guess that chaos energy had something to do with it. He sighed again and dropped his hand. He got to his feet and looked over at Star. "I'm going for a walk." He said to her as he began to move away from the red workshop. Star nodded in response to this. "Be careful though, we don't know what else could happen here." She called to him. "I'll be alright." He answered.

Moon had been standing near the woods, as if acting as lookout to see who would arrive back first. But that wasn't what her mind was focused on right now. It was that fox named Eneco who had forced chaos energy into her. His eyes that had turned blazing blood red were still clear in her mind. And the words he said echoed through her memory, as if taunting her. _"Perhaps your friend Neco told you about me…then again, perhaps he doesn't trust you enough"_ The memory was making her doubt herself _"He probably detests how you're always fallowing him around and worrying about the smallest thing wrong with him." _It made her doubt her trust in Neco as well. She attempted to clear her mind of the memories, banish them as if they had never happened. She heard footsteps and turned around to see Neco.

Neco slowly walked over next to her, seeing her distress in her eyes. "Is something the matter?" He asked. She shook her head and looked up at him again. "No…I'm fine." She said. But the memories wouldn't leave her. ("It can't be true…It isn't.) She told herself, but his voice in her memories wouldn't stop taunting her. "No, something's wrong and it's bothering you, I can tell. What is it? He asked her. "Nothing's wrong Neco…I was just thinking…" She said. "I'm fine…" She repeated. Neco placed his hands on both of her shoulders. "Please, if you don't tell me what's wrong, I can't help you." He said. His eyes were locked onto hers, making it nearly impossible for either to break the eye contact. Moon stared at his eyes as she attempted to say she was fine once more, but Neco interrupted her. "Please, I'm concerned for you. I want to be able to trust you that you'll tell me when something's wrong." He said.

There it was, the word that Eneco had made her doubt. Trust. Here was Neco, not even knowing what was troubling her was forcing her to find out if what Eneco said was true or not. She had no choice, looking at his eyes she couldn't lie anymore. "…What did he do?" Neco asked, not even needing her to say what was troubling her. "Things that he said…" Moon said, finally breaking eye contact, looking down. "What was it?" Neco asked. "…He made me doubt your trust…and he said that my constant worrying over you made you sick…" She said. "Neco…please tell me…why did he look so much alike you even though you're so different?" She said, looking back up. Neco let his hands slide off her shoulders and turned around. "…I had hoped that it wouldn't be necessary to tell you about him…" He said. Moon felt like something inside her was being slowly crushed.

"…Moon…Eneco is my brother…" Neco began. "I know you thought that all my family was killed…well they were…Everyone I still can call family." He said. Moon didn't know what to think, it was if Neco was speaking in riddles. "Moon…My family's murderer…" Neco said turning to face her again. "Is my only brother, Eneco." He said.

* * *

With Sonic and the halfway reconstructed Egg Emperor

Sonic smirked, this was too easy. The huge robot did not have its shield and its weaponry was far too easy to dodge. It didn't even have enough room to do its charge attack at him. He'd already put enough dents in the robot to anger Dr. Eggman to the point he was tearing at his mustache, the only hair on his head the doctor had left. Its weak point was wide open for constant attack, and that's what Sonic did. He jumped up and delivered a kick right to the small glowing weak point on the oddly shaped large robot's torso. Though the force behind it wasn't a lot, the robot was flung back against the wall. "Oh come on, it shouldn't be this easy." Sonic said smirking as he looked up at the doctor behind his two inches of bulletproof glass. "It shouldn't be!" Eggman yelled. "I reinforced the weak point! Your attacks shouldn't even so much as scratch the paint!" He continued ranting.

"Heh, maybe I'll crack it open to make sure you did your work right." Sonic said as he simply walked over to the badly damaged Egg Emperor. Just then however some stream of silver liquid like substance burst clean through the metal walls and formed a puddle on the ground. "What the?" Sonic said aloud as he took a step back from it. And for good reason, the stuff started moving on its own. A thin stream of it stood straight up from the puddle. It remained like that for a while, before it shot towards the fallen Egg Emperor. The robot was engulfed by it. "What is that doing to my beautiful machine?" Eggman yelled as he hit buttons on his control panel like crazy. The robot didn't respond. However the silver substance was quickly at work.

It was as if the robot was being eaten away by acid to reveal another underneath its armor. The whole Egg Emperor looked like it was being melted and then solidified in a new form, the Silver substance becoming a part of it. When it was finished, a new robot stood in its place. A more correctly shaped version for one based off a humanoid. It was blue, and instead of an arm, on one side it had what resembled several guns fused into one, ranging from a rifle to a plasma cannon. It had red artificial eyes. "…TARGET IN SIGHT. ELEMINATE SONIC THE HEDGEHOG." It said as it aimed the massive weapon at the blue hero. "This…isn't good." Sonic said taking another step back.

The robot fired several bullets at the hedgehog, who quickly started running to avoid them. He picked up speed and jumped onto the wall, continuing to run, not even handicapped in speed by being sideways. He kicked off the wall, leaping towards the robot's head, his fist drawn back, obviously intending to smash the robot's head with his fist. The robot had high reflexes surprisingly, knocking Sonic back with a single sweep of its normal hand. "Ouch…" Sonic said, rubbing his head as he got back to his feet after colliding with the wall from being swatted away. "Alright you, so you're a lot faster then I thought. Doesn't matter, I'm still gonna smash you to pieces." Sonic said glaring at the robot. "YOUR ATTEMPTS AT MY DEFEAT ARE FUTILE." The robot said as it aimed the weapon again. Sonic quickly took off to avoid getting hit. The robot was using its plasma cannon this time, and the beam it fired was highly destructive, literally shredding the walls it touched. It quickly stopped though. "ERROR, INSIFICANT ENERGY TO MAINTAIN PLASMA CANNON ASSALT." The robot said.

"NEW STRADGY UPDATED." The robot then said, punching through a wall and pulling out the mechanical equipment just behind it. It found what it was looking for. The yellow chaos emerald that had been snatched from Sonic's grasp earlier was now resting in its metal hand. The silver substance appeared again on its torso and shot out, grabbing the emerald and pulling it within the robot. The torso solidified again and the robot turned its attention back to the azure hero that was its target. It raised its weapon again, using the plasma cannon…but something different happened this time.

Sonic ran like crazy to avoid the beam of the plasma cannon, and he did…but it didn't matter. The force of the beam was more then enough to act as a weapon. The beam missed Sonic, but the force from it hit him like a load of concrete being dropped right on top of him. He was winded, wounded, and definitely having a hard time getting back up, but he was still lucky. a direct hit from that plasma cannon could have killed him. "Gotta get up…Can't let this thing win." Sonic said trying to push himself back onto his feet.

"FIRST TARGET NEAR ELMINATION, WILL PERSUE TARGET'S ALLIES NEXT." The robot said as it took massive strides towards the fallen hedgehog. Sonic felt as if those words had attempted to finish him off before the robot even got near him. This thing was going to try and kill his friends after it had finished him off. There was no way, absolutely no way, in this world that Sonic was going to allow that to happen. "…You ugly collection of scrap and who know what else…" Sonic said as he managed to force himself up onto one knee. "You're intending to hurt my friends…" He said. His head felt heavy and he was still breathing hard, this from just one attack and the robot had more where that came from. "I…I don't care if you go after me…" Sonic still pushed himself to get up and keep fighting anyways. "But try and hurt my friends…And You'll Pay!" He yelled, suddenly developing a flaring bright blue aura around him. "…THERE MUST BE AN ERROR IN MY SENSORS…TARGET IS EMMITING CHAOS ENERGY WITHOUT POSSESSING A CHAOS EMERALD." The robot said, actually taking a step back as if in fear. Great winds swarmed the room from nowhere, defying logic as they passed through barriers in their way. "…You're going down." Sonic said, his emerald green eyes glaring at the robot.

* * *

CLIFFY!

Sonic: Alright! Yes! This is gonna be awesome!

Eneco: Heh, I get to be more evil in the next chapter…(evil smirk)

Yep, now tell me what you thought of this chapter and…wait, how many pages is this? (goes to check) Wow, it got to page eight! This was a long chapter and it still didn't go as far as I originally planned it would!

Neco: Stop glorifying yourself…

…I control your fate you know…

Neco: I'll be good…

Now on to business, since you reviewers don't seem to want to be reviewing like you should be...here's something that just might get your fingers moving. I will honor to the best of my ablitity, the top reviewer, in the skit thingies i do before and after each chapter! Now review...PLEASE! (chibi eyes)


	8. Sonic VS Robot!

Here we are again, and now to reveal to you all the ending of the battle between Sonic and the robot. As well as what the heck that silver stuff is. But before that…I believe we have some one to honor…

KESTRIL195 FOR THE MOST REVIEWS AT THE MOMENT I AM UPDATING THIS!

Now, onto the story!

* * *

With Neco and Moon (yes, I'm so evil, I don't put the Sonic versus big robot first! )

Moon looked at Neco, tears were started to form in his eyes as they reflected painful memories of a past he wished to forget, while the rest of his face remained indifferent. It was a heartbreaking scene. "…Neco…" She said. "I didn't want to tell you…because I wished that he was gone from my life…" Neco said. "…That day I came home…and there they were all…dead." He said, the tears flowing stronger. "…He just stood their…his family's blood on his very hands…and he was laughing. Not insanely, but as if he found their deaths amusing…" He continued. "He just looked at me…He said something about how he had done all that for power…and it still wasn't enough…He just walked by me…I didn't even try to stop him…I just stood there horrified." He finished.

Moon had started to cry as well. She hugged him, burying her face into his chest. "...Neco…I'm so sorry." She said. Neco used a single hand to lift her gaze back up to him. "You don't need to apologize for his actions." He said looking down at her. "Don't worry…when I find him, I'll make sure he regrets what he did to you and the rest of my family." He said, smiling even though the tears were still flowing down his cheeks.

"How touching, you have feelings for someone brother." A voice taunted. Neco's eyes instantly shot up into the trees. There standing on one tree's lower branch was his brother Eneco, smirking at them. "You!" Neco yelled as he grabbed his guns. Moon shuddered at the sight of Eneco, taking a step back. "So you came to torment her mind more! Or did you come to finish off the rest of your family!" Neco yelled, aiming both guns at his brother. "Far from that brother. I come here because I have answers to what's happening to you." Eneco said, dropping his smirk but not moving from his spot on the tree branch.

* * *

With Knuckles and Rouge. (still no Sonic versus robot)

They walked slowly on their way towards Tails' workshop. They hadn't spoken to one another since Knuckles had pulled Rouge out of the fire trap. He hadn't even taunted her about being careless, and she hadn't accused him of just saving her to touch her hand or something like that. Knuckles held onto his fistful of master emerald shards as they moved along, something was bothering him.

It was Rouge that surprisingly was the first to break the silence. "Knuckles." She said to get his attention. "Yeah?" He responded, not turning to look at her. "In that chamber, with the fire trap…there was a tablet on the wall." She said. "…And?" Knuckles asked. "The tablet had pictures of the chaos emeralds and master emerald on it." Rouge answered him. "…Anything else?" Knuckles asked. "That's all I saw before you pulled me away from the flames, I only noticed them because someone had taken the time to paint that part of it." Rouge said. "…If we can we'll have to see just what else is on that tablet." Knuckles announced. "The generations gone by have left many clues, but that one, placed so far away from the rest of their ruins…We'll have to figure out why." He continued. Rouge nodded, then smirked and added "And if there is anything of value, I'd b more then happy to examine it for you." "Oh no you don't bat girl, I'm not trusting you alone with any of the ancient artifacts." Knuckles growled. "You'd have to be able to find them before me Knucklehead." Rouge taunted before running off ahead of him. "Get back here!" Knuckles yelled chasing after her.

* * *

Inside Eggman's base (I bet you said finally)

The great winds began to swirl around Sonic, growing so great that they were actually lifting his body off the ground slowly. His quills that had cut through metal countless times and remained as sharp as knives moved by fractions of an inch as the winds blew through them. The aura surrounding him was flaring violently, and his body was actually gaining a sort of luster to it.

The robot quickly fired at the suspended in mid air hedgehog. The bullet completely missed him, hitting the wall behind where he had just been. Sonic had somehow moved from his spot in mid air to behind the robot without even being noticed, a current of the blue aura left behind fading from view. The robot swung around in an attempt to smack the blue hedgehog down. Sonic appeared again right besides the robots head and gave it a mighty kick, sending the whole thing colliding into a wall. Sonic was then standing with both feet planted firmly on the ground. The aura stream dieing down again to where only the brightly flaring blue one around Sonic remained.

"Impossible! Is he able to use chaos control without even using the chaos emerald?" Dr. Eggman wondered aloud as he watched the scene below. "No…That aura is left behind as he moves…it's impossible to keep up with that movement, but I can see the path he took…" He said aloud. "As much as I hate that hedgehog and that type of ability would infuriate me, I can't help but be amazed at this power…what could it be that's allowing him to do this?" He said aloud.

The robot shoved itself back up. It again aimed the massive gun at Sonic. "YOU SHALL PERISH." The simulated voice stated. "I don't think so…" Sonic responded. The plasma cannon began to charge, but Sonic was suddenly directly above the robot's shoulder joint. He flipped as he fell, bringing down his foot right on the joint, smashing through the metal and making the entire arm weapon and all fall from the rest of the robot. The robot attempted to swat Sonic away, but the blue hedgehog had moved before it could reach him. Again the strong winds swirled around him. As they lifted him into the air once more he tightly drew himself together, as if preparing to launch a homing attack. The winds around him grew more violent, as if a miniature tornado had formed around him. Then he quickly extended his limbs to their full lengths, causing the winds around him to fling out in all directions. They were heavy with chaos energy and shredded through all obstacles.

The two inches of bulletproof glass shattered as Eggman ducked to avoid the destructive winds and sharp shards of glass. The robot was being ripped to pieces as it was blown backwards. Its pieces fell to the ground in chunks. As the wind died down and Sonic fell to the ground, the silver substance from before quickly flowed out of the pieces. The chaos emerald rested in a puddle of it. Sonic took a step towards it, but it quickly shot towards the wall, piercing through it and bringing the chaos emerald along. "…Damn it." Sonic said as he could only watch the last drops of it flow through the opening.

He suddenly felt weaker. The aura was fading and he dropped to one knee. "What's happening…?" He wondered aloud. His vision was blurring and he felt his sense of stability and space slipping. It was if he no longer could tell if he was even right side up anymore, his senses were exhausted from the drain of strength. He squinted to attempt to regain his sight, but it only worked so much. However one thing stood out in his failing vision, something that wasn't there before. An incredibly tall cloaked figure that was standing not too far away. "…It will soon begin." The figure said. "Prepare yourself, one who has received the blessing of the powers of chaos." The figure continued. "Who…are you?" Sonic managed to say, before his conscious left him and he collapsed on the ground.

* * *

With Neco, Moon, and Eneco

"What do you know?" Neco said, not letting his guard drop as he kept Eneco in his sights. "I know what happened that night you were watching over the white emerald… If you had not managed to somehow absorb the chaos energy, you'd be dead already." Eneco said, his red eyes locked on the two. "I'm sure you've felt as if something inside of you was changing. That is the chaos energy within you at work. It is reacting to events already set in motion." He continued. "What are you talking about?" Neco said in confusion. "You haven't put it together yet?" Eneco said as if irritated that he needed to explain. "Every time the world is put into danger, the chaos emeralds are somehow involved. They act as if they are tools of fate itself." He began. "My employer requires the use of the emeralds, and the actions he is taking are beginning to affect any trace of similar energy types. Thus the chaos energy within you is forcing you to adapt, as the energy is effected by your emotions." He said, as if he was irritated by this fact. "Anyone with connection to the chaos energy is going to be forced to adapt… somewhat like the first step towards the process of evolution you could say." Eneco's smirk returned.

Moon managed to fight her fear down, some of her natural courage restored. "But what about me?" She yelled at Eneco. "I know that there's some chaos energy still in me somewhere…but I feel like I did before you and your creepy friends tried to turn me into some kind of weird horror movie creature." She said glaring at the black fox. Eneco gritted his teeth. "That's because of that damnable master emerald!" He yelled, but his disturbingly calm face soon appeared again. "However, with the small sacrifice of that echidna unit, we won't have to worry about that for some time." He said.

Eneco then reached inside his trench coat and pulled something out, a bright red emerald, perfectly shaped and the same size as the chaos emeralds, easily held with one hand. "Remarkable imitation isn't it?" He said looking at it. "Perfect replication of look and feel. The power emitted isn't quiet as grand as the real thing, but it was more then enough to fool even the ultimate life form." He said, holding it as if he were showing it off to them. "And now brother…Time to test your skills." Eneco said, extending his arm towards his side. The red fake emerald glowed brightly, as a sphere of the red light formed just below Eneco's hand. A stream of silver substance shot out from the surrounding vegetation into the light, taking the form of a gun that was twisted with evil's intentions. Eneco took hold of the gun and slowly aimed it at them.

* * *

With Knuckles and Rouge

Knuckles was still chasing after Rouge, almost forgetting his cares as if he were playing a simple game of tag like a child would. This peace however was quickly shattered as the two of them nearly ran into a crowd of black figures, each still having the pure crimson eyes with no pupils. "Surrender the shards of the master emerald, or perish." One of them declared in its monotone voice. After the initial shock of their numbers was gone, Knuckles growled lowly. "Not unless you manage to pry them from my cold, dead, crushing grip." He said. "Then we have no choice, we must eliminate you." Another said. "Bring it on you creeps!" Rouge said, shifting into a battle position as the crowd swarmed them in an attempt to crush them quickly.

Knuckles' fists flew through them, making those closest be flung backwards into the others. Rouge's objective was to eliminate as many of them as possible in as short of time she could manage, so her kicks were more targeted then Knuckles' punches. However, the black ones did not seem to feel any pain, as they continued to rise after being attacked. The two of them were fighting a losing battle, and if they didn't do something to take their foes down quickly, the battle would be over soon for them.

* * *

With Neco, Eneco, and Moon.

Moon growled and pulled out some of her own guns. "You aren't going to hurt him." She said lowly, her ears pulled back in anger. She aimed as was about to fire. Neco's eyes suddenly turned green as he saw everything happen in slow motion. Moon fired and the bullets headed straight for Eneco. However Eneco was already pulling the trigger on his weapon. As things began to move at a normal pace again, Neco yelled "Move!" and shoved himself and Moon out of the sudden immense blast that came from Eneco's gun, leaving a small crater where the two had just stood. Eneco simply stood there, the gun in his hand, not having even felt any kickback from the weapon.

"Thanks Neco." Moon said as she shook her head and sat up. She glared at Eneco. "Why are you doing this to us!" She yelled. Eneco ignored her, his gaze was on Neco who was getting to his feet. "That was good reaction time…However it wasn't the level of response I desired." Eneco said. Neco glared at him and placed himself between his brother and Moon. "Perhaps you need…" Eneco began, tossing the emerald in the air and catching it with his one hand. He tossed it up high, and then drew his hand back. "…A little more motivation!" Eneco yelled. He shoved his hand forewords, deep red bolts of energy actually flying from his hand and striking Neco, flinging him clean overtop Moon and against a tree. Eneco caught the fake gem as it came back down, not even moving from his spot atop the tree.

Moon growled as anger consumed her thoughts. "Leave him alone!" She yelled as he jumped to her feet and rapidly fired faster then she had ever attempted to before. Eneco simply stood there. Several strands of the same silver substance flew out, engulfing each bullet and falling to the ground, forming a small shallow pool of the stuff.

Eneco slowly reached up and touched something near his ear. "I didn't need assistance. A defense such as that was not required for this situation." He whispered. "Do not go showing off your abilities, we're not taking chances with your brother until we know exactly what the chaos energy has made him capable of." A deep voice, sounding as if it was put through some sort of device to alter its sound and prevent it from being recognized, said in his ear through a communication device. "Remember, your prime concern is to keep them occupied while we execute the other parts of the operation, we must keep them separated." The voice said. "I remember the plan, I simply know that this is a good opportunity to collect data." Eneco whispered. "Fine, but don't put yourself in the line of fire like that again, let the minions do the work." The voice said. "Understood." Eneco finished, letting his hand fall to his side again.

Eneco gave some sort of hand signal, and the pool of silver liquid began to react and move. It suddenly went straight up, like a fountain, but not a drop of it fell back down towards the earth, it simply hung there in mid air. Neco and Moon took a step back as a torso and limbs began to form from the substance. As it finished taking shape, it took on an entirely black color, and its eyes opened to show it lacked pupils.

Moon stared at the newly formed black villain. "…So that's how those damn things are made!" She growled. "Not entirely, but that liquid is a key part of it." Eneco said. Soon more of the black foes appeared, surrounding them. "What's the matter Eneco! Can't fight your own battles anymore!" Neco yelled. "Far from it brother, as much as I would love to enter combat against you, you are still valuable to my employer. Tell you what, I'll let you live for now, and if you can make it through all them, then perhaps one day I'll face you." Eneco smirked.

"Now, what was it that your hedgehog friends did, to go somewhere very quickly…? Ah yes, I remember now… Chaos Control!" Eneco yelled. The fake emerald surrounded him with red light, and he was there no more. "No way…" Neco whispered as he looked where Eneco had once stood. He didn't have long to keep his gaze there, as there were many black opponents wishing to harm both him and Moon surrounding them. He grabbed his guns and began to take aim, the only thought currently on his mind was ("Why does this stuff always happen to me?").

* * *

Sorry that this chapter is shorter, but I've had a bit of writer's block and I wanted to get this updated. No funny rants today, maybe next time, I'm tired and it's nearly time for me to go to sleep for the day. Cya later! 


	9. Angel Island Invaded

Hello everyone, welcome to the ninth chapter of my story. I apologize that I take so long to update, but when I feel like writing other things get in the way, and when I have time to write, I feel like doing other things. Hopefully, I'll get some free time to work on this story soon, because I'm greedy for attention and like hearing that people like what I write. (hey, that last part rhymed) And now, to honor someone yet again. It's my friend Kay again, she's reviewed the most.

NOW ON WITH THE STORY!

Neco: And our suffering goes on.

Hey shut up. Now go get me my MP3 player and download some of the songs from the Sonic games to it.

Neco: Do it yourself…

(evil glare)

Neco: …On second thought, I'll do it.

That's what I thought you said.

* * *

Inside Eggman's base 

Sonic groaned as he slowly began to awaken. As he pushed himself up off the floor, rubbing the side of his face that felt sore from laying on a flat surface, he looked around to notice he was still where he had been when he was last conscious. ("Why didn't Dr. Eggman try to get rid of me when I was out cold?") He thought as he got to his feet. His answer soon came as he saw the bald head of the good doctor sticking out just over the control panels from the balcony above. With the glass shattered Sonic easily jumped into the balcony.

"Sonic! I don't have time to deal with you, you infuriating hedgehog!" Dr. Eggman yelled as he was hitting various buttons and barking orders into a microphone. Sonic couldn't really believe what he was hearing. Dr. Ivo Robotnik, the man that would do anything to be rid of the azure hero, had him entirely defenseless and hadn't done a thing about it. However, a quick glance at the few still operating monitors told why.

There were dozens of various black colored figures attacking the base outside, the eggbots standing no chance against them.

One of the black figures stood in front of the security camera. "Attention Dr. Eggman, surrender yourself immediately or face destruction." It said before crushing the camera with a kick. Eggman grasped at his bare skull in fury. "I will not surrender to a pack of freaks like that!" He yelled aloud. "Heh, seems like we've got a common foe once more Eggman." Sonic said, knowing that fact made the doctor even angrier. The doctor was nearly tearing his mustache out in his anger now.

"Listen, I don't care what you do, but I'm out of here." Sonic said. "Cya later if they don't turn you into an omelet." He said jumping back down towards the ground. Eggman looked at the screens that remained functional as Sonic ran off. "…Grr, I have no choice, I must evacuate!" He yelled to himself. He began to move as fast as his pudgy body would allow him down a hallway to his escape craft.

* * *

Outside Eggman's base. 

The black beings were everywhere, and everything with an Eggman logo was being destroyed at their hands. Unfortunately for our friend Omega, so was anything without a logo as well. (If you don't believe me, look, Omega has no Eggman symbol on him) "YOU ARE IMPEDING MY PROGRESS TOWARDS MY OBJECTIVES, STAND ASIDE OR BE ELEMINATED." The robot said, clenching its metal clawed hands threateningly. "It is you that shall stand aside or be eliminated E-123 Omega." One of the black life forms stated as it stepped closer towards Omega. Omega suddenly grabbed it by its neck and threw it at the others. "I SHALL CEASE TO RUN ANY PROGRAMS THAT SIMULATE WHAT IS REFERED TO AS MERCY. ATTACK AT YOUR OWN RISK." Omega stated as his hands slid back and missile silos slid into place. "Very well then, your ability to function is forfeit now." Another of them said in the same voice as they began to move closer to Omega.

Shadow slowly walked on, tossing aside every eggbot in his path without even seeming to try. His head hung low, as if for some reason his air shoes were the most interesting thing in the world at that moment. It was hard to believe that the Shadow only just earlier that day and this one were one and the same. They were however, no matter how much Shadow seemed to be lacking in any phenomenal abilities. His feet fell heavily on the ground with each step. His mind was far from the current area. He was too focused on his own internal battle to notice the real one going on around him very much. However, reality has a way of getting back at you when you fail to pay attention to it. Several of the black beings had formed a circle around Shadow without his notice.

"Shadow the Hedgehog, surrender yourself now or experience oblivion." One of the creatures said. Shadow raised his head and looked around to find the situation he had put himself into by having his focus divided. "…I don't know who sent you or why, but I don't feel like dealing with you all right now, so leave." He stated, sounding like his voice was horse. "That is not an option." Another said. "If you refuse to cooperate…" a third said. The circle grew smaller as they approached. "Then we will have to take you by force." Another finished. Shadow braced himself for their assault, but unlike him, they were not distracted by what he had just seen.

Shadow managed to block the first one's punch, but another had grabbed him by the neck from behind, and even the ultimate life form needed oxygen. He was suddenly flung into the air. Several of the beings leapt up and began to beat him in several ways at once before sending him hurtling back towards the metal ground. He hit the ground with a faint but sickening crack sound. The force of the collision actually made his whole body bounce from it slightly before resting back onto the ground. He slowly shoved his head off the ground. He was in bad shape already, and the fight had barely started. He was suddenly kicked sharply in the side and rolled for quite a few feet. The black creatures surrounded him again.

"You lose." One said as it raised its hand high above its head, preparing to finish this conflict. Shadow blinked, his vision blurring slightly. He felt so weak, it infuriated him. However just as the creature started to bring its hand down, Shadow registered a sudden small flow of wind near him, as the being was flung into the wall. Creating a shallow impression of its body against the metal. Shadow managed to look to the side to see none other then the blue hero himself, his leg in midair with his foot exactly where the being's head had been only seconds earlier.

Sonic let his leg fall so he was properly balanced once more. "Heh, Shadow, I thought you were tougher then this." He said with his signature smirk. The other creatures kept their gazes trained on the fallen hedgehog. Shadow felt his rage swell. ("…Android or not, I refuse to be out done by that blue idiot!") He thought angrily. He kicked with his feet, flipping himself back upright. "You all are going to regret even thinking about taking me on." He said, rage evident in his voice.

One came at Shadow with a heavy punch. Shadow shifted to one side and grabbed its arm, then swung around and threw it into another. One threw another punch at his head and he ducked then tripped it. Another tried to kick him and Shadow jumped up and then threw himself down atop it. As he got back to his feet, yet another came at him. Shadow simply elbowed it in the stomach, so hard that it fell flat on its back. "Anyone else want to try and attack me!" Shadow challenged. He slammed his fist into another creature's face and then grabbed it to throw into yet another. His foot flew into the remaining one's skull. He breathed heavily as he looked around aimlessly, searching for another target.

"Shadow?" Sonic's voice said, breaking through to the battle enraged hedgehog's mind. "Come on, the other's probably need our help if there are more of these things." The hero said, for once being the voice of reason. "…You're right." Shadow said. The onyx colored hedgehog momentarily forgot what he had seen earlier, right now he just wanted to show these things just how big of a mistake they made when they attempted to take on Shadow the Hedgehog.

* * *

In the forest 

"Damn it, where are all of these things coming from?" Neco said as he reloaded his weapon then fired at one of the creatures that were attacking them. "How should I know?" Moon called to him as she emptied machine gun's ammunition into a crowd of them. "What kind of creatures are these? They form from puddles of silver liquid and then can survive even a point blank shot?" Neco said as he continued to defend his life from the circle of creatures drawing ever closer around them. "Just stay down you freaks!" Moon yelled as she continued to fire at the creatures, sometimes throwing her current weapon at them and pulling out another.

("Brother, what is it you're trying to do using these things?") Neco couldn't help but wonder as he continued to fire into the mass of the black beings. They were beyond anything he had ever seen before, and the odds of him surviving seemed to be getting slimmer by the moment. "I hope the others are in a better situation then we are." Moon said.

Somehow one of the creatures had managed to get in between them. It drew its fist back, aiming right for Neco's head. Suddenly a burst of light came through the surrounding forest and hit it square in the chest, flinging it out of sight. The sound of heavy metal footsteps was heard as several of the creatures were flung left and right as whatever it was came closer. A blue machine with orange accents, apparently some type of walker by the looks of it, had made its way through the creatures towards Neco and Moon. Sitting at its controls was none other then Tails, his goggles lowered over his eyes. "Hey, I figured you could use some help." The young teenage fox said with a smile on his face.

"Miles Prower. Deactivate your weapon and surrender now or be destroyed." A black being demanded, yet again in monotone. Tails instead let his walker's gun give the answer for him. "Come on, Star's still back at my workshop, we've gotta make sure that none of these things went after her too." Tails said. His walker turned around and began to march back the way it came. Neco dropped his focus from the remaining creatures and began to quickly fallow the two tailed genius.

They soon made it back to the workshop. Sure enough, black beings had begun to surround the red building. However, several of them were being knocked away. Tails fired a couple of rounds into the black creatures to break them up so that they could open up a path to Star, who was whirling a kunai with chain around, making her seem more dangerous then the attackers. "Are you alright?" Moon asked as they managed to get to her. "Yeah, don't worry about me." Star answered. "Heads up, there's more on the way." Tails informed them. "What are these things?" Star asked. "We're not sure ourselves…but my brother seems to be somehow connected to them." Neco said. "You're brother?" Star was confused. "A long story…" Neco said.

* * *

At Eggman's base 

Sonic and Shadow ran past numerous Eggbots and black beings fighting one another, the black beings winning. What they were more focused on was the large number of the creatures attacking something that was setting off several explosions. As they approached, they began to recognize Omega.

"Omega, ready your laser cannon!" Shadow yelled as he began to tap into the reserve amounts of chaos energy he was able to store in his body in the event he needed it and there wasn't a chaos emerald nearby. "AFFIRMITIVE." Omega responded as his metal hands slid back into his arms. "Chaos…CONTROL!" Shadow yelled, as time around the three was slowed. A large purple beam erupted from the ends of Omega's arms. Though the force of them without a third person to help hold Omega in place threw the robot back a ways and he was unable to change aim in the mid blast, it was still very destructive and managed to clear a wide path.

"Come on, let's get going." Sonic said. "ERROR, OBJECTIVE EGGMAN IS MY PRIME CONCERN." Omega answered. "Eggman? He fled already." Sonic said. "Omega, you know that the blue hedgehog and his friends are foes of Eggman as well, assisting them may assist you in your objectives." Shadow said, knowing how the robot thought. "…AGREED, I SHALL RENDER ASSISTANCE TO SONIC THE HEDGEHOG AND ALL OTHERS DEEMED NECCISARY." Omega responded.

* * *

With Rouge and Knuckles. 

"I. Don't. Care. How. Many. You. Send. At. Me. I'm. Not. Giving. Up. The. Master. Emerald. Shards!" Knuckles yelled, each word punctuated by his fist colliding with something. He and Rouge were getting tired, true they had taken out many of the black creatures, but there were hundreds more getting closer all the time. The red guardian however kept fighting as if he didn't even notice. But to be truthful he probably didn't.

Rouge was on the other hand beginning to grow tired. She was used to being able to use stealth against her enemies, but the overwhelming numbers were slowly wearing away at her endurance. Eventually, one of the creatures managed to land a hit, right to her torso, winding her and throwing her to the ground.

Knuckles soon noticed this and took action. Ignoring his own safety and the foes he had been locked in combat with, he dashed towards her and uses his fists to push back the creatures in an attempt to create a safety zone she could recover from the attack from. She didn't thank him. She was too busy trying to hold onto her conscious state of mind. These thing's blows were meant to keep whatever they made contact with down and out.

"Come on you creeps! Is that the best you've got!" Knuckles yelled as he threw punches left and right. He wasn't thinking strategically, he was just fighting the only way he knew how too, with everything he had. He was putting enough strength to break boulders down to rubble behind his punches, and these things were taking him head on. Knuckles just kept fighting and fighting. Dodging attacks wasn't his concern. He was determined to make it so that anything that got close enough couldn't manage to land a decent hit.

"TERIAAAAA!" Came a familiar battle yell. Something darted around the battlefield, throwing itself at the creatures with great force. At the same time, another voice yelled "You all shall perish!" Then a line of the beings were suddenly…bowled over is the best the echidna could describe it. However his guard went up as he heard "ANILATION!" being called out in a mechanical voice. He looked over to see a robot literally swatting the creatures away with its mechanical clawed hands.

Glad to have some of the creatures focus off him, but still being hard headed and not knowing the situation he shoved creatures out of his path as he made his way towards the robot. "Hey Knuckles, wait, he's on our side." Sonic said as he grabbed Knuckles' shoulder. "What? Our side, but he's an Eggman robot." Knuckles said in confusion. "I don't get it really either, but Shadow seems to know him, and he's helping us out, that's all I need to know." Sonic said.

"If you two are quiet finished, let's get out of here." Shadow said to them. "Right." Knuckles said, heading back and bending down to offer Rouge a hand up. She took it and he pulled her to her feet. "Heh, I knew you liked her Knux." Sonic chuckled. "You pick now of all times to taunt me?" Knuckles growled. Sonic just smirked and started to run off.

* * *

With Tails and the others. 

Tails led the way in the Cyclone as they fought through the creatures that managed to block their path. "Where could the others be?" Neco wondered out loud. Moon stopped and seemed to look for something. "Ah-hah!" She proclaimed as he pulled out a flare gun. She loaded it once and then fired the flare into the sky. It burst apart with a bright flash. "Hopefully they should be able to see that and head this way." She said.

The four of them kept moving on. There seemed to be less opposition to their progress in this direction for some reason. ("…I don't like this…This is getting to easy.") Tails thought as he began to check the status of the Cyclone on the display screen next to his controls. There was just something out of place here, he knew it.

He was right. They were suddenly being attacked from behind by thousands of the beings. "Run!" Tails yelled as he swiveled the Cyclone around and attempted to thin the crowd of black beings with some fire. "What about you?" Star asked. "I'll be right behind you, just go!" Tails yelled. Moon grabbed Star's hand and began running as Tails told them.

They soon however met a wall of stone. "It's no good. We'll have to find another path!" Neco yelled as he looked around. "I hear something." Moon said. "…Something's headed this way." She said, pointing her gun towards the surrounding trees. However she soon lowered it as she saw who it was emerge. "We saw your flare and headed this way." Shadow explained. "But we're being fallowed, too many to fight off." Rouge added. "Unfortunately, that's the same situation for us." Tails said as he approached the area. "So we're cornered eh?" Sonic said.

"…SCANNERS INDICATE A NETWORK OF TUNNELS BENEATH THE ROCK LAYER." Omega said, looking at the rock wall they were trapped against. "Alright, but how do get into it?" Knuckles asked. "STAND BACK." Omega said as one of his massive metallic hands slid back and a missile launcher clicked into place. He fired once, blowing a huge gaping hole in the wall. "QUICKLY! THEY WILL BE WITHEN THE IMMEDIATE AREA IN APROXIMATELY 12.4 SECONDS." He ordered.

"You don't have to tell me twice." Knuckles said as he dove into the hole. Sonic, Moon, Star, Neco, and Rouge soon fallowed him. "Good luck Omega." Shadow said. "MAY YOU ACCOMPLISH YOUR GOALS AS WELL." Omega said to Shadow. Shadow climbed into the hole. Tails approached the hole as the creatures started to approach. "GO NOW!" Omega yelled. "But what about you?" Tails asked. "IT DOES NOT CONCERN YOU, NOW GO!" Omega ordered. Tails nodded and used the Cyclone to jump through the hole. Omega then used his great mechanic limbs to collapse the hole, having detected Oxygen in the tunnels and therefore knowing that they would be able to survive. "ERADICATE!" He yelled, dashing at the beings.

* * *

MWHAHAHAHAHA! CLIFFY! KUPO! 

Sonic: Kupo?

Tails: It's a thing that Moogles say.

Sonic: What does it mean?

Tails: Who knows?

KUPO! ALL OF YOU THAT HAVEN'T SEEN THE TRAILER FOR THE NEW SONIC GAME, SHAME ON ALL OF YOU! I DEMAND THAT YOU WATCH IT! IT PROMISES NOT TO SUCK LIKE THE RECENT ONES DID!

Shadow: …It's official, ending his life would lessen his suffering.

Sonic: Shadow, quit plotting how to kill the author or he'll make it so you really are an android.

Shadow: He wouldn't dare.

I'm hyper and eat lots of sugar, of course I would dare.

Shadow: … I hate my life now.

READ AND REVIEWMY LOYAL READERS!


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